My cup of tea

About two years ago I discovered, to my horror, that a even single cup of tea or coffee was elevating my blood pressure substantially for several days. As well as monitoring my blood pressure, I checked out my experience on the internet, discovering that although the condition is not especially common, it is well-recorded. Sadly, decaffeination does not resolve the issue: I know this because I tried switching to decaffeinated tea and coffee. I think that the problem is, in part, that decaffeination does not remove all the caffeine, and in part because teas and coffees contain a cocktail of potent chemicals, some or many of which are unaffected by the decaffeination process. On reflection, I now recall that if I drank tea on an empty stomach, such as before breakfast, I would feel extremely nauseous until I ate something substantial. Further, drinking cheap green tea was likely to make me feel nauseous regardless of the repleteness of my stomach.

I still hanker after a nice cup of both tea and coffee. I would give much once again to be able to sip a delicate sencha (Japanese), a smoky lapsang souchong (Chinese), a light darjeeling (Indian), a malty assam (Indian), an aromatic Earl Grey (Imperial British), or even just a fruity flavoured tea, such as lemon or peach. There is a type of Chinese tea, puer tea, the name of which I frequently forget, that costs the earth because it gets buried in the ground for a year or something, that I never knew about until after I stopped drinking tea. Many years ago I was given a pack of russian caravan tea, but I did not rate it especially highly. Likewise the cannonball tea, the leaves of which were rolled into small pellets. The mountains of the moon tea I drank at Betty's in York was remarkable only in name. On the other hand, when I was in Japan, I mostly drank roasted tea. Now I can no longer drink tea, I am limited to tisannes. For a reason I do not understand, I can only drink a small quantity of chamomile. Every day I make myself an infusion of hawthorn, linden and marshmallow. I struggle to drink a litre of it through the day even though it barely tastes of anything. I find both hibiscus and rosehip too acidic and astringent. Blackcurrant elevates my blood pressure, as does licorice. I can usually drink something that has strawberries in it, so a red berry or fruits of the forest melange can be okay, although the tea bags of this name that I bought in Italy were fairly disgusting. In contrast, the elaborate tisanes avaiilable in Germany, including in the motorway service staations, were extremely pleasant, being made with chunks of dried fruit and visiible slivers of spices: although expensive, they were worth drinking.

My coffee needs are much easier to describe: give me a decently-made (that is, topped with an appopriate espresso 'crema') double espresso made with finely-ground Monsoon(ed) Malabar beans (a richly-flavoured coffee from south west India the flavour of which is deepened and matured in the monsoon winds of Northern Kerala - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsooned_Malabar).

Road crash [tbc]

This posting was intended to be part of a longer essay. What is currently presented here was written in sections over several days. The piece was then left, abandoned really, as a draft for three and a half years, awaiting my return and completion. I returned to it on 12 June 2015, but completion still has a wait.

-----

I recently read several BBC news articles about road traffic accidents in the UK. Not only did I variously concur, sympathise and empathise with the sentiments implied / expressed, I found myself rehearsing an array of thoughts and reflections for which a weblog posting would be an adequate response. I hope that by writing this posting I shall not simply express well-formed ideas and perhaps arrive at a deeper understanding, but that I shall also reach out towards some thoughts and ideas that are currently beyond my grasp. I hope, too, that my chosen focus will bear such scrutiny, and that I am sufficient to the task.

The articles are presented as a mini-website, uploaded / updated on Tuesday 15 and Thursday 17 December 2009. In contrast with some BBC mini-websites that I have read, such as the focus on UK energy use and production, which consist of articles written over a long period of time and later brought together under an umbrella concept, this series of articles appears to have been conceived and written as a single project. There is a page of editorial, Death on Britain's roads, giving facts, headline statistics, analysis and opinion. There is a fascinating and impressive series of graphical representations of statistics. There is an equally fascinating and impressive 'mashup' utilising an interactive Google map of the UK showing the precise location of every road traffic accident involving death, searchable by police authority and postcode, giving details of casualties, and some with a link to a contemporary news report. There is a sequence of short articles called Anatomy of a crash, an in-depth report about a single road traffic accident based largely on the police investigation and interviews with the victim's widow. In addition, the mini-website presents headline statistics, photographs, and video reports. The mini-website's range of different kinds of resources gives it a substantial and well-thought-out feel.

The annual death toll on UK roads is more than 2,500 deaths: 2,538 in 2008. Over the past ten years nearly nine people each day have died on Britain's roads: 32,298 lives lost, equivalent to the death of everyone in Monaco. One of the points made in the editorial is that despite the individual tragedies that each death represents to surviving relatives, friends and colleagues, within British society as a whole these deaths are ignored, taken for granted, become invisible. In contrast, train derailments, ferry sinkings and plane crashes receive considerable news media and public attention, even when few passengers are killed. It would seem, too, that in the latter tragedies responsibility and blame are sought and established, whereas road traffic accidents are seen more as an occupational hazard, a fact of life. Four points:

1. The most obvious point to make about this distinction is that when a road traffic accident occurs, at worst a handful of people die. In contrast, an aeroplane crash might involve scores or casualties, and a train smash hundreds. Our attention is inevitably drawn towards events that involve the death of more people.

2. My perception of risk is not based on likelihood of an accident but on the consequences of the accident were one to occur. Rear-end shunts on the road are relatively common, but do not commonly result in death. On the other hand, train wrecks are uncommon but when they do occur, it is likely that people will die.

3. If I am the driver of the vehicle, I usually feel safer than were I in the hands of someone else. The classic example is 'sympathetic braking' by the front seat passenger in a car. It is easy to imagine that, as a car driver, I might notice a hazard in time to avoid it. In contrast, when I am a passenger in an aeroplane, there is absolutely nothing I can do to alter the course of what will happen.

4. The public focus in the 1999 Ladbrooke Grove (UK) rail crash was on the fact that one of the two train drivers allowed his train to pass a signal at danger (SPAD). I have no experence of driving a train. How hard can it be to sit in the driver's cab and drive the train: you don't even have to steer? The Wikipedia entry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladbroke_grove_rail_crash gives details of the Cullen enquiry's findings that show, amongst other things, that the driver who passed a signal at danger was only recently trained and highly inexperienced. Although I never believed that flying an aeroplane was the easiest of activities, it was only when I took a series of lessons to fly a light aircraft that I came to appreciate the intense complexity involved in flying a jet airliner. Anyone can row a boat on a river or lake, and it is not hard to learn to sail a dingy. However, people who captain super-tankers, cruise liners and passenger ferries, are required to take many exams and have years of experience. My point is that, from a position of ignorance, it is all-too-easy to imagine that little extra is required to control the vehicles in which tens or even hundreds of people can die at once.

---

Perhaps one of the things many people realise is that using a motor vehicle on the road involves making a huge number of safety-relevant decisions, so many, in fact, that the only way to use the road is to remain oblivious to all but the most obvious safety issues. I recall giving up driving a car for a while when I was unable to cope with the anxiety I felt about all the things that could go wrong. Road users do not expect to get every decision right, and witness time and again the consequence-less result of poor decisions: driving round a bend too far onto the other side of the road, but no vehicle was approaching in the other direction; not aquaplaning on a wet carriageway despite travelling too fast for the road/ weather conditions; driving through traffic lights that recently turned red; incautiously turning into the path of another vehicle that is travelling sufficiently slowly so that no collision occurs. Perhaps, just as people feel reluctant to talk about life insurance and to draw up their last will and testament, part of the resistance to wearing seat belts was about not wishing to face the possibility of being involved in a road traffic accident. However, seat belts point to where people typically place reliance for their safety: on car manufacturers: crumple-zones, airbags, anti-lock brakes, ice-warning alarms. Modern vehicles are brimming with devices to help us to avoid a collision, including the long-established external lights, mirrors and horn; and to improve our safety in the event of a collision, including the trend towards the use of well-armoured 4 x 4s.

[... to be completed]

Wurds

I wrote the following in response to a colleague hearing my voice in my written words

I enjoy the harmonies and dissonances of the relationship between what is spoken and what is written. I buy dictionaries, and have many in my library. However, unlike most people, I am rarely perturbed by poor spelling. I enjoy the multitude of spellings to produce the same sound (to, too, two, tu), and the multitude of sounds permitted from the same spelling (tough, cough, dough, plough). I enjoy the subtleties (as well as its near anagram: subtitles) of nuance between practice and practise (spelt differently but pronounced the same), advice and advise (spelt and pronounced differently), alternate [to take turns] and alternate [a substitute] (spelt the same but pronounced differently). I love fora, formulae, concerti, tableaux and majors general. I love ‘erb tea, bayzle, oreggano, rowt and vayze. I have a strong preference for Munchen, Nurnberg and Koln; for Addawa (Ottawa), DC (Washington DC) and Manhattan (New York City), because these are the names used by the people who live and work in those cities..

In my experience, what is said is often easier to understand if it falls into the natural cadences of spoken English. Of course, William Shakespeare recognised this with his iambic pentameters. In my experience, what is written may also be easier to understand if it falls into the natural cadences of spoken English. What I write is often crafted to sound like how I speak. Perhaps almost equally, what I say is often sufficiently well considered that it sounds like what I would write.

However, I am aware that many people typically speak in stumbling, incomplete and sometimes only semi-coherent clauses. This is given the illusion of a single train of thought or narrative by face-to-face engagement, in much the same way that film creates from a sequence of photographs the illusion of continuous movement. Therefore, to be comprehensible, there must also be formality in what is written.

For this purpose, I sometimes use formulae. For example, in recognising that the Canadian postal coding system [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postal_codes_in_Canada ] (for example, K1A 0B1) is less prone to transcription errors compared to that used in the UK (for example, DH1 2PZ; W1A 4WW) because the six characters alternate sequentially between letters and numbers, I present times/dates not as spoken but in a consistent formula: 12:34 Friday 12 February 1554. (However, in dating computer files I use the Japanese system: 15540212.)

Surprisingly, perhaps, I welcome the use of clichés in speech when their purpose is to aid intelligibility:  allowing quick links to what is already known and understood, but also listen for their use as a substitute for thought and opinion (sales patter).

My ‘natural’ way of speaking is elaborated code that incorporates my classical and scientific formal education, my experience of travel throughout Europe and North America as well as to Japan, and my familiarity with many cultures through my love of literature and movies. When I feel refreshed I am usually able to speak from the restricted code of the person with whom I am interacting. However, when I am tired I revert to speaking from within my comfort zone involving words of many syllables and that may be unfamiliar to many of the people with whom I work; a consequence of which is that I inadvertently distance people.

I have loved word play from my earliest years, and enjoy subtle puns. Careful attention to nuanced and multiple meanings is also the domain of poetry, where apposition is currency. Of course, for the Mersey poets (Adrian Henri, Roger McGough, Brian Patten: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Penguin-Modern-Poets-Mersey-McGough/dp/0140421033/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323435629&sr=8-1) poetry involved play.  Although I have written poetry with which I am satisfied, it has rarely arrived by FedEx or DHL, but by scooping ripped-up photographs from beneath Parisian photo booths. Sadly, my tendency towards obsession with minutiae does not serve me well regarding style. Attention to style is required to write extended prose that is worth reading (Dickens, Hardy). Instead, I am left fretting about the inappropriateness of a full stop in a heading, the mosquito bite of a supermarket queue’s limitation to nine items or less, and my Lynne Truss-like frustration with incorrectly-sited apostrophe’s (sic).

I wonder whether the voice audible in the above is that with which people who know me are familiar [implied question mark].

Tories announce bad ideas

Yesterday, just ahead of the Conservative Party Annual Conference, Eric Pickles announced that £250 million had been found to enable local councils to re-instate weekly refuse collections. This is a terrible idea. Weekly bin collections encourage people to throw away things that could be recycled.Our bin is emptied two or three times each year, simply because we re-use or recycle everything else.It is not difficult, although clearly the commitment to recycle is beyond many people.

Also yesterday, Philip Hammond, Minister for Transport, announced an intention to raise speed limits on motorways to 80 mph. This is a bad idea not only because the number of accidents will increase and the intensity of the damage to life, limb and vehicles, but also because petrol consumption will worsen, thus increasing CO2 emissions.

Nation, identity and government

Surely the term 'nation' is used for mythological purposes. The term is tied up with a sense of identity. It invites citizens to identify with, and to strengthen their sense of belonging. The mythology points towards (apparent) genetic and cultural similarity, and so is often used to distance "people who are not like us", whether brown-skinned versus white-skinned, culturally Christian versus culturally Muslim, and even genetically-Norse versus genetically Saxon (here in the North East of England there is a strong desire to claim Viking genes, thus differentiating people in the North East from people in southern England). I say that it is a myth because it represents a story that I choose. I could choose a different story. An obvious example of this mythologising is the frequently-used term "this island nation" used by many British people to differentiate themselves from people of continental Europe, and to disclaim the validity of 'supranational' government from Strasbourg / Brussels. A second example is the US attempt to forge one nation out of disparate peoples, that is, to invite them to believe that they are one people.

The myth of the nation is powerful because it helps to determine perceived political legitimacy. In Belgium the myth of a Belgian nation appears to be stretched near to breaking point. The myth of a Macedonian nation straddling Greece and Macedonia terrifies the Greek government. The myth of a Kurdish nation has been perpetually squashed by Turkey, Iraq and Russia.

I believe that the term 'nation' is also increasingly in crisis because of the eagerness of many people to embrace dual (multiple) identities: African American, Asian British, Polish British, French Muslim, Galician Spanish (there appears to be a Celtic identity seeking to create unity between Galicia, Brittany, Cornwall, Wales and Ireland).

Cherry blossom petals

I arrived at this movie from several places: some familiarity with animé, including the entire R2 Studio Ghibli collection; some familiarity with Japanese cinema, past and present; a visit to Tokyo and Kyoto several years ago.

Five Centimetres Per Second [DVD] [2007], like Still Walking [DVD] [2008], is unadulterated Japan in several respects. The characters behave in a restrained and understated manner. Cherry blossoms (but not cherries) and railways (but not the grease and technology of trains and rails) are important. The voice acting, especially the two female leads, is superior in the original Japanese.

The movie consists of three episodes. In each there is a pervading sense of sadness, loneliness and unresolvedness. The first episode has the most satisfactory story. Although the director, Makoto Shinkai, in interview states that the theme of the movie is the rate at which things happen (blossoms drift to the ground, a train journey takes many hours, a rocket suddenly blasts off [presumably from Korou] into space), it is the exquisite and pervasive sadness infusing the movie that lingers, as in Grave Of The Fireflies [DVD] [1988].

One of the wonderful features of Five Centimetres Per Second is that it bases itself in the real world, with real, recognisable places, such as in Tokyo, and realistic activities and motivations. In this respect, the movie resembles movies such as Only Yesterday [DVD] [1991] (as well as aspects of Whisper Of The Heart [DVD], Grave Of The Fireflies [DVD] [1988], The Girl Who Leapt Through Time [DVD] and Ocean Waves [DVD] [1993]).

Just as in most Studio Ghibli movies, some of the backgrounds in Five Centimetres Per Second are sumptuous. The attention to small details is gorgeous, for example, the articulating footplates between carriages on the train. Moreover, the 'camera angles' in Five Centimetres Per Second feel fresh and alive - although I suspect that this feature may be drawn from more traditional manga animé. The main characters in Five Centimetres Per Second, with their doe eyes and pointed noses, are pure animé. In contrast, the main characters in Studio Ghibli movies are drawn to appear more realistic. An aspect I find appealing about Studio Ghibli movies is that there can be many objects that are animated simultaneously. (The Ghibli museum in Mitaka screens, amongst other shorts, Water Spider Monmon, which is alive with movement.) In contrast, I found the staticness of characters and objects in Five Centimetres Per Second, which at times appeared like a sequence of still pictures, disappointing and mildly irritating.

The movie is paced appropriately to the subject material: slow and quiet. However, the final section of the movie transforms into a kind of pop-music video, which may be indicative of some kind of emotional resolution, but if so it went over my head. The music was okay, but not haunting as in Spirited Away [DVD].

The English subtitles of the Japanese soundtrack are perfectly reasonable, despite some typographical errors. However, each subtitle quickly vanished, and occasionally I had to replay some dialogue in order to read what was said.

The extras on the DVD are the usual.

Overall, I have absolutely no reservations about watching the movie, nor about buying it. It will undoubtedly appeal to people who enjoy feel-sad movies, as well as students of animé and animation. I am comfortable with the 4* rating I have given it.

My cultured father

Sunrise at 08:29 this Minimal cloud cover should mean that the south eastern sky will start lightening at about 07:00. Sunset at 15:48 means that the day is two minutes longer than yesterday.

Today is the 75th anniversary of my father's birth. However, he died nearly 19 years ago. I feel sure that he would have lived-to-the-full all the years he was denied by his early and untimely death. He would have continued to rejoice in the natural landscape of his adopted Cornwall. He would have continued to enjoy music, the arts, crafts and the social activities that characterised the final ten or so years of his life, some of which were interests developed from boyhood with the encouragement of his mother, and that in turn he passed on to me. (I remember that he had two vinyl LPs (long-playing records): Tchaikovsky's "1812" and "March Slav" that I got to know well, and a jazz record called "How Hi the Fi" (that I have just checked out as being recorded by Buck Clayton and Woody Herman in 1954) but I cannot remember ever having heard it. I now quite often listen to jazz on BBC Radio 3, along with acres of 'classical' music. I think that my father was quite satisfied about me becoming a 'Prommer' (i.e. attending the Henry Wood / BBC promenade concerts every summer evening for three months, mostly in the Royal Albert Hall in London). I am uncertain about whether he ever attended a Prom concert. However, he took my brother and me to a concert of Harrison Birtwhistle music at the Royal Festival Hall in London sometime in the late 1960s or early 1970s, and it is obvious that he was familiar with this concert venue. This was the venue for one of the all-time greatest performances of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, in mid-November 1957, of which I have a recording. It is possible that my father attended the concert..I like to imagine that as a 21 year old young man, recently returned to London winter smogs after National Service in sunny Cyprus, he was trying hard to ignore the coughing and to concentrate on the performance.

Happy new year

Happy new year. Welcome to 2011 (not that numbers make much difference to reality). I hope that this year will be peaceful, prosperous, fulfilling, satisfying and above all happy.

Durham UK is 54.8 degrees north, and 1.6 degrees west. This means that sunrise and sunset are later than London UK in the winter. It also means that, living closr to the Arctic, the weather in Durham is mostly a good deal more miserable than the south east of England. Hmm!

Sunrise today at 08:30, although the total cloud cover, gloom and rain means that no-one on the ground will have noticed. Would that I were seated in a jetliner heading for New York City. Sunset today at 15:47. I am looking forward to longer daylight hours, sunshine, warmth.

The snow has now all-but gone, although there remain heaps of dark, mucky, frozen slush heaped up out of the way: one heap I saw yesterday was at least 2 metres high. Although wintry showers are forecast over the next week, and plenty of overnight sub-zero temperatures, it does not look like a return to Siberia is imminent.

Movie review: Still Walking, directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda

It is interesting reading other reviews for this movie, which demonstrate the possibility of experiencing the same thing so differently. Still Walking is 'a comedy of manners', reminiscent of the movies of Eric Rohmer. (Comedy as distinct from tragedy, not in the sense of being humorous.) Like a haiku, nothing is brightly coloured, overstated, or has the impoliteness to stand out in some way. Typical of Japanese etiquette, the characters rarely say or act on what they really mean, and this is revealed only as the story unfolds. Characterisation is superbly handled through script, direction and acting. Unlike in western movies, there are neither heroes/saints, nor dastards/demons. It would be too easy to watch this movie through western eyes and miss the subtle, the nuanced, and the quiet reversals that culminate in overall balance. In western culture it is held that the more deeply an emotion is felt, the more extremely it is expressed. However, the expression of emotions addressed in this Japanese drama is muted: it is possible to arrive by another route at a sense of how deeply those emotions are felt. The movie is perfectly paced for its material (not the high-octane outbursts of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, or of Look Back in Anger), but may be considered intolerably slow by people who enjoy thrillers, adventure movies and rom coms. (Instead, think Tarkovsky.) Unlike a Woody Allen movie, Still Walking is not an easy watch, requiring concentration and attention, although neither is it especially difficult: the plot, such as it is, is interesting enough for me not to require it to entertain me cheaply (even though I enjoy the jokes in Wasabi). There is no feel-good pay-off at the end. There is no 'the end' (c.f. Lost in Translation). I do not know the other work of director Hirokazu Kore-eda, but I now feel motivated to find out more.

2001: A Space Oddysey

I wrote the text below in response to a thread of comments regarding a brief, critical user review of the DVD 2001: A Space Oddysey.

I think that Anthony Costine's Rothko observation is valuable: for me, Mark Rothko's huge, nearly-formless canvases serve as the closest fine art is able to approach to a spiritual gateway - his works present me with the opportunity safely to stand on the threshold between life and death. The Clarke / Kubrick novel / screenplay (they wrote them together) considers the breathtaking enormity of the leaps made by humankind from our genetic divergence away from other primates. We are not really being invited to consider the detail of each technological development and innovation, but to gulp at the height of the cliff edge on which we now perch. The story then moves on to consider ways in which humankind may further develop, perhaps in ways that will seem god-like to the just-beyond-savages who we are today. 2001 is intended neither to be an intellectual movie, nor a thrill ride, nor a drama, no more than were one standing on the brink of the Grand Canyon, or sitting in front of a Mark Rothko painting, or watching a movie (such as Stalker) by Andrei Tarkovsky. Perhaps the 'mistake' is to consider it (along with Solaris by Andrei Tarkovsky) primarily as work of science fiction. Maybe the fact that Clarke was a science fiction writer, and the movie was marketed as science fiction misdirects how the movie can most engagingly be viewed.

2010 August 05 Thursday

We drove south from Durham, and installed ourselves at the Marriott hotel in Slough: it calls itself the the Heathrow/Windsor Marriott despite being some miles from either place. We have stayed in better Marriotts. However, the quick dip in the pool was a refreshing pick-me-up before meeting my relatives in a pub restaurant the other side of Madenhead (nothing vegan for me.)

2010 August 07 Saturday

We drove from the Marriott hotel in Slough ("Windsor - Heathrow") to the Channel Tunnel. We had time to stop at Sainsbury's in Ashford, Kent, to buy groceries. Once through the tunnel, we drove to Antwerp. Not one of the three vegetarian restaurants we found was open. The rain was torrential, and very wet we returned to our hotel - the Raddisson Blu Park - where we had a suite with a kitchen. I cooked a meal using food I brought for cooking in Berlin.

On Saturday morning we drove to Ashford in Kent, where there is a decent Sainsbury's and I was able to shop. From Ashford it is only 25 minutes to the Channel Tunnel. The tunnel was very busy, and we were pulled out, once again, for a terrorist check - I have been subjected to many times more than my fair proportion of these. We arrived in Antwerp yesterday evening after a highly unpleasant drive from Calais. It rained constantly, sometimes torrentially, and the spray from the other vehicles on the motorways reduced visibility at times to below 50 metres. The Radisson Blu hotel in which we are staying is gorgeous, and we are sad that our visit is for only one night. Having got ourselves settled, we walked out in the pouring rain to find something to eat, but each of the three vegetarian eating places we could find turned out to be closed for August. Antwerp is the same size as Liverpool, so my wife and daughter could have found a pizzereria or something. However, our room at the hotel includes simple cooking facilities, so we decided to return to the hotel to cook a meal there. Ever one to be prepared, I cooked some spaghetti, and fried mushrooms, tomatoes and onions. I had chosen to bring dried basil, ground black pepper and vegetable stock powder from home, and with the unfiltered extra virgin olive oil I had bought from Sainsbury's, the meal was especially tasty. The only thing missing was a candle for the table.

2010 August 06 Friday

My sister and her partner, Janine, were married this afternoon in a civil partnership ceremony held in Maidenhead, Berkshire, UK. Family and friends were in attendance. Later, a reception dinner was held on Queen's Eyot, a small island in the River Thames, near Bray. The occasion was a delight.

We attended a civil partnership ceremony for my sister and her partner of several years. The occasion was a delight, for not only did we meet up with my two and a half sisters and their families, but we also met some of my new Canadian relatives-in-law, with whom we got on very well. Although the ceremony itself took place in Maidenhead, the reception was held on a little island in the middle of the River Thames, requiring a boat trip each way.

Climate change mitigation versus democracy?

Following a broadcast on the BBC Radio 4 Analysis programme (20:30 Monday 24 May 2010) presented by Justin Rowlatt (the BBC's 'Ethical Man'), I posted the following text on the BBC's Ethical Man weblog:

"I listened to the radio programme with much anticipation. I was pleased that the issue was taken seriously in terms both of the science and the politics. There were various aspects with which I variously wholeheartedly agreed or disagreed. Three aspects, however, that I considered to be very weak were: 1) democracy is not one thing; democracy means different things to different people in different places; the UK has a system of representative democracy (hence no capital punishment despite the untested preference of the electorate). 2) Much of what is already taking place (erection of wind turbines, replacement of incandescent light bulbs, new hybrid and electric vehicles) is happening between government and industry, not by popular choice at the retail level (we will buy whatever is available)- this is about the relationship between government and corporations in which the electorate never get any say anyway. 3) Too often "the expressed will of the people" has more to do with the relationship between government and the popular press - were the red-tops to champion major lifestyle changes to ameliorate climate change, their readership would almost inevitably follow."

I wish to develop these ideas further, although this weblog is not the place where I intend to leave the text. The issues belong on my Green website.

The radio programme is reported to be currently available on the BBC iPlayer.

1. Democracy under threat?
The term 'democratic' seems to be used frequently in a wide variety of circumstances to indicate that something is politically good in some way. It seems obvious to most people who choose to live in economically-developed western countries that even the most imperfect of democracies are superior, say, to the society portrayed by George Orwell in 1984. If nothing else, this points to democracies that fall short of some notional democractic ideal. A democracy probably requires regular, popular elections (as distinct from elections by a small minority) and a voting system that delivers an outcome readily acceptable to the electorate. In the US it is considered democratic to vote for a variety of public officials beyond politicians, e.g. police chiefs. In the UK such an election is viewed with suspicion, believing that public officials should be impartial. In the UK, the rights of trades unions to require their members to withdraw their labour are enshrined in law - trades unions being seen as an example of dispersed democracy. Winston Churchill saw the dispersal of democracy amongst the institutions of a country as a process of democratisation. It is not clear to me what aspects and features of democracy would have to be suspended to effect a political programme to counter AGW (anthropogenic global warming). It is, however, clear to me that to suspend all that we call democracy would so fundamentally change the nature and fabric of contemporary UK society that inentional suspension would be beyond contemplation. More realistically, the suspension of certain aspects of the democratic political process could happen, as it did during the second world war. This does not have to be a slippery slope towards totalitarianism.

UK General Election

This short animation is excellent:

http://tinyurl.com/32cg2q3

UK General Election 2010: 27 days to go

I was out yesterday evening delivering LibDem leaflets through local letterboxes. I wonder if people really read the leaflets. I know that they moan about feeling ignored if they don't receive leaflets. "I shan't vote for X because they didn't bother to canvas my vote." I do look at the leaflets I deliver, but rarely consider them of interest. They are usually full of platitudes, with attention being given to knocking one or other rival parties / rival party leaders / rival candidates.

I live in a constituency where the LibDems are contending with Labour who are long-standing incumbents. The City of Durham constituency, in the heart of a former heavy industry region, and until recently one of Labour's safest seats, and at which the Conservative candidate used to poll the second largest number of votes, has gradually become a marginal seat at which the Conservative candidate now risks losing their deposit. The presence of Durham University means that there are undoubtedly some people who hold Liberal Democrat values. However, there is no way on Earth that half the voters are Liberal Democrats at heart. The only way in which the LibDems can hope to have their candidate elected is to persuade would-be Conservative voters to vote LibDem instead. This is done by emphasising that the Conservative candidate has no chance of winning, and that the best way to avoid returning the Labour candidate, the incumbent MP, to Westminster, is to vote LibDem. Would this not be a dishonest distortion of the political complexion of the constituency? For in reality the constituency is about 50% Labour, 25% LibDem and 25% Conservative. Surely the votes cast should reflect these proportions? However, underlying the attempt at distortion is the antiquated, unsophisticated, first-past-the-post voting system. Other elected governmental bodies in the UK use a form of proportional representation to elect their representatives, resulting in a more honest picture of the political complexion of the electorate. I should much prefer an immediate switch to a voting system that is better than that which encourages local parties and voters into a kind of dishonesty. I am enthusiastic to be part of the democratic process, even if it is merely delivering leaflets, but I am not comfortable being part of a system that attempts to persuade people who hold Conservative values to vote LibDem simply to prevent the Labour candidate from winning. My political philosophy, although most closely expressed in party political terms by the Liberal Democrats, is still much closer to that of the Labour Party than that of the Conservative Party.

UK General Election 2010: 28 days to go

One of the less seemly aspects about the run-up to a general election is that politicians of one or other persuasion will offer tempting words that seem to contradict what they have spent the previous 4 or 5 years asserting. Whilst I can remember back into the 1970s talking enthusiastically about exchanging the still-current unrepresentative first-past-the-post system voting system for some form of proportional representation, the issue remains a long-standing Liberal Democrat policy. However, there is a significant credibility gap when Johnny-come-lately Labour Party politicians (such as Ben Bradshaw on last night's edition of BBC 2's Newsnight programme) bob their heads above the parapet and state that they too have long been staunchly supportive of proportional representation. There is an equally yawning credibility gap when Conservative politicians propose wacky populist ideas such as the direct petitioning of parliament for debate, as though they, the Conservative Party, have forever championed the wishes and rights of poor and ordinary people.

Although the attention being given to whether National Insurance tax (paid by employers as well as employees, as distinct from income tax which is paid only by employees) should be raised feels like phoney sparring, the issue has drawn out into the open the Conservative sympathy towards business leaders: should the cost of repairing the economy be borne by the little people, in the form of reduced public services, or shared between the people and business, in the form of a tax? Public engagement in the election will begin in earnest when the politicians begin talking about migrant workers, immigration and the EU. I regret that the somewhat nationalistic prejudices (about which they feel proud) and mildly xenophobic attitudes (which they deny, but cannot refute) of many white British people makes it difficult for them to listen to fact, reason and rationality. Were the Conservative Party to propose strict limitations on 'foreigners' taking work in the UK, I believe that the Conservatives would easily win an outright majority. Were the Conservatives also to have the courage of their deep-seated convictions and offer the electorate the tantalising possibility of somehow distancing the UK from the EU, the Conservatives would win a landslide victory. I do not understand the Liberal Democrat enthusiasm for a referendum on Britain's engagement with continental Europe - turkey's voting for Christmas is a phrase that comes to mind. I believe that these are the issues that many people would prefer the electioneering politicians to be addressing.

UK General Election 2010: 29 days to go

It is with a sense of relief that I greeted yesterday's announcement by Gordon Brown about the date of the next UK general election. The coming four weeks will be reminiscent of that passage in George Orwell's 1984 when Winston Smith and his colleagues are frantically busy with Party activity. In contrast to the UK system of government, elections are held on a regular, cyclic basis in France and the US. I wonder what things would be like were the UK to hold general elections on a regular, say, five year cycle.

Although I am not a member of a political party, I have a deep prejudice towards participatory democracy. Accordingly I am a volunteer, posting political leaflets through letterboxes in some of the streets close to my house.

I find it interesting how I have constructed my voting preference:
1. partly on how I have voted in the past (a kind of inertia - I am the opposite of a floating voter);
2. partly on a comparison between my political values and those of party policies (I have already visited Party websites and downloaded/read some of their policy statements);
3. partly on who I see supporting each party (am I ever likely to vote for a party that draws its support from men who vie with Yakuza to cover themselves in body art?);
4. and partly on how 'attractive' I find the political leaders and their team (on this basis, I should prefer to have voted for Ted Heath over Margaret Thatcher; for Michael Foot over Tony Blair; Tony Blair over Gordon Brown; and Paddy Ashdown over Charles Kennedy or Nick Clegg). Were I given the choice, I should rather vote for Barack Obama, who I consider to belong to a class above most British politicians.

My Predictions
The Labour vote will reduce by 5% (77 seats) some votes going to the Liberal Democrats, some votes going to the UKIP/BNP, some votes going to the Conservatives, and some Labour voters choosing not to vote. This desertion will be more pronounced in the Home Counties, Midlands and East Anglia, where there will be the greatest number of seats changing from Labour to Conservative. In the north of England the Labour vote will decline, although by not as much, and it will have less impact on the seats held. Total number of seats: 272

The Conservative vote will increase by 5% (79 seats), some votes coming from Labour, some from the Liberal Democrats, and the rest coming from people who did not vote at the 2005 general election. The Conservatives will lose some votes to UKIP/BNP. The greatest number of newly-won Conservative seats will come from London, the Home Counties and the Midlands. Total number of seats: 289

The Liberal Democrats will neither gain nor lose total votes, being a beneficiary of deserting votes from Labour, but losing votes to the Conservatives. However, as a result they will lose four marginal seats. Total number of seats: 58

UKIP will do well in the south of England, and the BNP will do well in London, possibly East Anglia and parts of the north of England, but will not have any seats in the House of Commons.

The Scottish Nationalists will gain some votes from Labour, but lose some to the Conservatives. The situation in Scotland will remain mostly unchanged.

Plaid Cymru will lose votes to the Conservatives. On the other hand, if they can gain some votes from Labour, the Labour marginal at Arfon might give them a further seat at Westminster (from 2 to 3)

The situation in Northern Ireland will remain largely unchanged. Most of their MPs will vote with the Conservatives, but this will be insufficient for the Conservatives to secure a working majority.

Result: a 'hung parliament' at Westminster. A coalition government will not be formed. Instead, the Conservatives will enter a working agreement with the Liberal Democrats (as happened with the former Lib-Lab pact). There will be a further general election in March 2011.

At one with the world

The traffic in New York City is impatient, and pedestrians are jostling at road junctions. A Buddhist monk had been meditating in Central Park, listening to the song birds and the rhythm of the city. He is now walking serenely down Broadway and starts to feel a little peckish. As he nears Times Square the aroma of fried onions and hotdogs wafts past him. Approaching the hotdog vendor’s cart, he sees that the vendor is reading a newspaper. The monk says to the vendor “Excuse me, could you make me one with everything, please” and smiles to himself at the pun.

The sour-faced vendor, saying nothing, throws a steaming hotdog sausage into a bun, slaps some onions on top, squirts a line each of mustard and tomato sauce, and hands the completed hotdog to the monk. The monk pays with a ten dollar bill, and then waits patiently for his change. The vendor, having returned to reading his newspaper, ignores the monk. After a little while, tomato sauce already dripping onto the sidewalk, the monk asks the vendor, “Excuse me, but where’s my change?” The vendor growls, “Change comes from within.”

Journalism 2: functions of journalism in a democracy

I guess that I ought to read a journalism text book. All the same, it seems to me that journalism has several important functions in a democracy.

To inform
Journalists report what happens. To be precise, they report on some of what happens. Without journalism, I would know little about what goes on beyond my immediate activities. Were I not to know, then I could not adequately participate in local, regional, national or supra-national decision-making. How else could I be informed? I could read Hansard to know what has been happening in Parliament (I have in the past). I could access the websites of politicians in order to read their speeches (I do). I could data-mine the website of the Office of National Statistics (I do). I could manage without journalism, but getting at the information would require more effort. On the other hand, I would be reading information that I chose, rather than have someone else choose for me.

To witness
In times and places in which the journalism is weaker, more happens that ought not to go on. Would the atrocities of Srebriniza, or the human rights violations of Abu Graib, have occurred had journalists been present to witness what took place? What would I do if I had a journalist shadowing me? Anyone can witness, but journalists are professional witnesses.

To whistleblow
I enjoyed watching the movie All The President's Men, starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman. I often watch The Pelican Brief. Both movies involve journalists digging up the truth. It would be optimistic to suppose that many news organisations spent much of their time researching activities on which a whistle needs to be blown.

To hold senior people to account
I can listen neither to Jeremy Paxman on BBC 2 television's Newsnight current affairs programme, nor John Humphries on BBC Radio 4's Today programme. The interviewing style of both is not only far too abrasive for my taste, and almost perpetually sneering, but also rooted in the kind of conservatism that rejoices in its philistinism. However, what they also represent is the aspect of journalism that can hold to account politicians, business leaders, trades union leaders, and their like.

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