When the world biggest bank called a crisis board meeting about bad debt and sub-prime mortgage exposure I guess we should all start worrying a little more. The Bank of England have made it pretty clear that things are going to get worse before they get better, the question I wonder is whether Britain is sitting on it's own "sub-prime" type crash.
Northern Rock, whilst maintaining the line that it was only ever a liquidity cash flow issue, have been notorious for lending money to high risk client - hence their repossession rates having been so high. It seems unlikely, in a climate of low interest rates, that the bank is the only one that done this. So as the credit crunch continues to crunch what might happen next?
Saturday, November 03, 2007
The same end no matter the events?
The Metropolitan Police Commissioner seems to be under quite a bit of pressure doesn't he? But I can't help wondering that no matter what had happened the same would be true as well as the widespread criticism of the Police in general, especially if you think of the possible scenarios and what would have happened after that.
Scenario 1: Jean Charles de Menezes a valid subject and taken down.
Police follow de Menezes and take him down in the same place and way as before. Inevitable inquiry finds that there were health and safety failures putting the public and police at risk as they allowed a suicide bomber to get all the way on to a train before dealing with it. Systemic operational failures cited, people call for the Commissioner to reign.
Scenario 2: Jean Charles de Menezes a valid subject who successfully detonates himself on the Tube.
Inevitable inquiry finds systemic operational failure. Total failure by the Police to reduce risk to the public under Health and Safety laws and apprehend a terrorist before he successfully carried out an operation, phrases like "they had him in their sights but failed to act" would appear in print. Calls for the head of the Met to resign.
Scenario 3: Jean Charles de Menezes a valid subject and arrested on Tube by armed officers.
Inquiry finds that the officers failed to consider the risk to health and safety of the public by allowing a valid target to get on a train, as well as causing panic on the tube with plain-clothed officers waving guns. Systematic communication failures cited as cause going up the chain of command. Calls for the Commissioner to resign appear in the press.
Scenario 4: Jean Charles de Menezes not a valid subject but arrested on the Tube and later released.
Public outrage at an innocent man being apprehended on Tube and arrested at gunpoint causing unnecessary panic at a time of heightened awareness. De Menezes takes Police to court for unlawful arrest. Evidence reveals systemic failures in the police operation. Questions are raised about the unnecessary risk posed to the public by the police for waving guns around and also the question of where the "right man" might be. At some point the Met commissioner's head on a plate would be called for.
Having said all this I could just be a little too cynical about the way these sort of things usually pan out.
Scenario 1: Jean Charles de Menezes a valid subject and taken down.
Police follow de Menezes and take him down in the same place and way as before. Inevitable inquiry finds that there were health and safety failures putting the public and police at risk as they allowed a suicide bomber to get all the way on to a train before dealing with it. Systemic operational failures cited, people call for the Commissioner to reign.
Scenario 2: Jean Charles de Menezes a valid subject who successfully detonates himself on the Tube.
Inevitable inquiry finds systemic operational failure. Total failure by the Police to reduce risk to the public under Health and Safety laws and apprehend a terrorist before he successfully carried out an operation, phrases like "they had him in their sights but failed to act" would appear in print. Calls for the head of the Met to resign.
Scenario 3: Jean Charles de Menezes a valid subject and arrested on Tube by armed officers.
Inquiry finds that the officers failed to consider the risk to health and safety of the public by allowing a valid target to get on a train, as well as causing panic on the tube with plain-clothed officers waving guns. Systematic communication failures cited as cause going up the chain of command. Calls for the Commissioner to resign appear in the press.
Scenario 4: Jean Charles de Menezes not a valid subject but arrested on the Tube and later released.
Public outrage at an innocent man being apprehended on Tube and arrested at gunpoint causing unnecessary panic at a time of heightened awareness. De Menezes takes Police to court for unlawful arrest. Evidence reveals systemic failures in the police operation. Questions are raised about the unnecessary risk posed to the public by the police for waving guns around and also the question of where the "right man" might be. At some point the Met commissioner's head on a plate would be called for.
Having said all this I could just be a little too cynical about the way these sort of things usually pan out.
Friday, November 02, 2007
Liam Byrne's week goes from bad to worse
Can a minister's week get any worse? First of all the Immigration minister Liam Byrne gets himsefl caught up in a row about dodgy figures and makes an idiot of himself on Channel 4 News by merely attacking Cameron and ignoring the fact that the Home Office is seemingly making figures up as they go along.And now he's been done for using a mobile phone whilst driving breaking one of his own Government's laws. Not very good considering he's a former copper. He sent a letter to the Magistrate saying he was taking an urgent deportation call, ended up with three points, £100 fine with £35 costs and a £15 victim surcharge.
Don't forget though, he will use his earned money to pay for that. So that's us that are paying his fine really.
It isn't pickled politics, it's les politique au vinaigre
Have just stumbled across a rather bizarre post which essentially asserts that "Brits can't blog". The argument goes like this. The really popular blogs are not analytical enough, and tend to be echo chambers for media style gossip. Ergo they impoverish blogging.
The post on Westminister Wisdom was sparked by this post by Sunny on Pickled Politics. The post was titled "Challenging the elites, and the blogs" and made the same point about the current state of UK blogs and also goes on to the say that there is elitism in the NGOs, think tank etc towards blogs because of their impoverished debate level as already mentioned.
Isn't it wonderfuly amusing, and dare I say beautfiully ironic to see someone bemoaning blogs for being tabloid and requesting that debate be raised to higher purpose analysis away from the dumbed down masses, whilst simultaneously moaning about elitism outside the world of blogs?
Death to the tabloid proles, lets have elitist debate! Death to to the elitist snobs who stay away from us because of the tabloid proles! I wonder if that simple two sentence analysis is a little too tabloid?
The post on Westminister Wisdom was sparked by this post by Sunny on Pickled Politics. The post was titled "Challenging the elites, and the blogs" and made the same point about the current state of UK blogs and also goes on to the say that there is elitism in the NGOs, think tank etc towards blogs because of their impoverished debate level as already mentioned.
Isn't it wonderfuly amusing, and dare I say beautfiully ironic to see someone bemoaning blogs for being tabloid and requesting that debate be raised to higher purpose analysis away from the dumbed down masses, whilst simultaneously moaning about elitism outside the world of blogs?
Death to the tabloid proles, lets have elitist debate! Death to to the elitist snobs who stay away from us because of the tabloid proles! I wonder if that simple two sentence analysis is a little too tabloid?
Government blames full children for climate change
So our children are getting fat by eating too much, now the Government says that if you don't eat all the food on your plate you're killing the planet through climate change. Yes really. Do you remember when you were little and you just couldn't eat up all those cold peas and gravy? Remember how you were told to think of the starving millions in Ethopia?
Not anymore. No, if you're child fails to eat up all their dinner you are to remind them that are contributing to the wanton destruction of the planet. If they do eat up all their food you are to remind them that if they keep going the way they are they will become obese.
One wonders if the woman that said this, the Environment minister Joan Ruddock (now forever to be dubbed the ""If you don't eat yer meat, you can't have any pudding" Minister), asks for a doggy bag at all those dinner events that ministers like her go to?
Not anymore. No, if you're child fails to eat up all their dinner you are to remind them that are contributing to the wanton destruction of the planet. If they do eat up all their food you are to remind them that if they keep going the way they are they will become obese.
One wonders if the woman that said this, the Environment minister Joan Ruddock (now forever to be dubbed the ""If you don't eat yer meat, you can't have any pudding" Minister), asks for a doggy bag at all those dinner events that ministers like her go to?
Who's worth more a plate?
I have just learned that Iain Dale will be speaking at event to Tories in Dagenham and Rainham. The price of the tickets is £40 per plate. Meanwhile later this month, David Cameron will be speaking to Tories at an event in Bexley. The price of the tickets is £35 per plate. This "shocking news" story tickled me, hence I'm blogging it.
Don't feed the trolls - unless you want to
I've been online now for a very very long time. I can remember when using the Net was a purely console text-based experience and can remember when the Mosaic browser appeared and I suddenly had access to pictures of Erika Eleniak in her Baywatch swim suit that I could see instantly rather than relying on a description before download. There was something else that was true too. No matter where you went, you could never really be sure that people were who they said they were. Identity belonged to the character and not necessarily to the person behind the words.
This was the rule of the game that we nerds and geeks played in our little space away from reality. It was our new frontier, our Wild West, our social rules were simple, there were to be no rules unless otherwise stated, and even then all were based on trust. If you went into a chatroom called #hot_lesbian_chat then you knew you'd be kicked out if you told them about the enormity of your manhood and your ability to 'cure' them. Reality morphed itself into role-playing in this world, just as Second Life does today in graphics.
As access grew though, so to did the voices that didn't like the world we had created. Self-styled gurus with instinctively authoritarian tendencies began questioning - especially with the rise of blogs that allow comments with the label of 'anonymous' next to them - whether the Net should be a place that allows one to mask their identity. They began bleating about honesty and bullying. The 'anonymous' comment they said was denigrating discourse and in other cases was being used to disingenuously heap praise on bloggers. The schema of understanding for these critics is clear; if you allow anonymous comments then none of your comments can be considered genuine. Pretty dumb I know, but whoever said Internet users had to have a functioning brain?
Ben Macintyre in this morning's Times has raised these questions about anonymity and wondered upon its sustainability and the fact that you can say nasty things when you're masked. He's by no means the first opinion former to do so. Yet sadly like the others, and the bloggers who seemingly dedicate much of their life online to the cause they fundamentally fail to appreciate the technological problems that go with a 'no more anonymity Net'. For a start lets think about the so-called 'anonymous' comment. It is no more or less anonymous than the pseudonym with an email attached to it. At most it is simply irritating administratively because you may have multiple comments with the same name next to them from different people. Turning the feature off will change nothing in terms of identifiably because it will still be based on trust.
That last point is worth repeating. You still have to rely on trust about who that person commenting online is, even if they have a name other than ‘anonymous’. Just the same as when you meet a stranger in a pub and they tell you they live in Aldershot and their name is Mike. You do not ask them for their driving license to confirm their identity, you accept it and carry on. So what exactly is 'identity' online anyway? Some of the pseudo-technical self-styled blogging gurus seem to think that an email address helps with this situation but it is just as easily made up. Or they think that an IP address helps, whilst failing to realise that address space is in short supply so technologies can, quite legitimately rewrite source headers to exploit one single IP used by a thousand readers quite legitimately.
What's more the globe is littered with open and anonymous proxy servers. If I wanted to I could do this post and appear to be in Uzbekistan. It's not difficult if you RTFM. Someone could use two browsers, say IE and Firefox, and be logged into different identities using proxies on different continents. Masking yourself online does not require climbing a mountain of knowledge. The important point here is that of someone wants to be anonymous then they will be, and no matter what you try to do it will continue in a network that is interconnected across legal jurisdictions that often do not have cordial political relationship with each other. A rule set in Britain on identity will be meaningless if you bounce through Zimbabwe first.
One may not like anonymity, but it is a reality of the Net and on current trends always will be. There are simple answers to the “problem” though. Firstly, don't feed the trolls just ignore them (unless you’re bored of course). Second, if you're being harassed by email, filter the email address out, don't tell them, and they’ll be deleted before you even receive it – out of sight out of mind. Third, if you've got a commenter that is harassing you turn moderation on and deny all their comments, crucially don't bother telling them, you'll only end up in another debate. Whatever you do they will go ballistic because they hate you remember – you are the Admin, don’t forget it.
Fourth if you're being harassed on a bulletin board then stop posting. If you must go back to it because of the compulsive urge that can go with such things then re-register with a new nick and don't rise to the posts by the person you have a problem with. Last, but by no means least, always, and I mean always, remember this. The anonymous flamer in the open is easy to deal with and swot away. The ones you have to watch out for are the netiquette hypocrites that scream about bullying in the open whilst carrying out campaigns of harassments in private. They exploit the very online ethics they claim to hold so dear and they are the real problem.
If you find yourself facing one of these pious liars, then how you choose to deal with it is entirely up to you. Personally I like to endlessly bait them because there is little more enjoyable than seeing a Netiquette hypocrite bite and be too stupid to realise they've just been had. Anonymity isn’t a problem; it’s the ones who show themselves who create the genuine disharmony.
This was the rule of the game that we nerds and geeks played in our little space away from reality. It was our new frontier, our Wild West, our social rules were simple, there were to be no rules unless otherwise stated, and even then all were based on trust. If you went into a chatroom called #hot_lesbian_chat then you knew you'd be kicked out if you told them about the enormity of your manhood and your ability to 'cure' them. Reality morphed itself into role-playing in this world, just as Second Life does today in graphics.
As access grew though, so to did the voices that didn't like the world we had created. Self-styled gurus with instinctively authoritarian tendencies began questioning - especially with the rise of blogs that allow comments with the label of 'anonymous' next to them - whether the Net should be a place that allows one to mask their identity. They began bleating about honesty and bullying. The 'anonymous' comment they said was denigrating discourse and in other cases was being used to disingenuously heap praise on bloggers. The schema of understanding for these critics is clear; if you allow anonymous comments then none of your comments can be considered genuine. Pretty dumb I know, but whoever said Internet users had to have a functioning brain?
Ben Macintyre in this morning's Times has raised these questions about anonymity and wondered upon its sustainability and the fact that you can say nasty things when you're masked. He's by no means the first opinion former to do so. Yet sadly like the others, and the bloggers who seemingly dedicate much of their life online to the cause they fundamentally fail to appreciate the technological problems that go with a 'no more anonymity Net'. For a start lets think about the so-called 'anonymous' comment. It is no more or less anonymous than the pseudonym with an email attached to it. At most it is simply irritating administratively because you may have multiple comments with the same name next to them from different people. Turning the feature off will change nothing in terms of identifiably because it will still be based on trust.
That last point is worth repeating. You still have to rely on trust about who that person commenting online is, even if they have a name other than ‘anonymous’. Just the same as when you meet a stranger in a pub and they tell you they live in Aldershot and their name is Mike. You do not ask them for their driving license to confirm their identity, you accept it and carry on. So what exactly is 'identity' online anyway? Some of the pseudo-technical self-styled blogging gurus seem to think that an email address helps with this situation but it is just as easily made up. Or they think that an IP address helps, whilst failing to realise that address space is in short supply so technologies can, quite legitimately rewrite source headers to exploit one single IP used by a thousand readers quite legitimately.
What's more the globe is littered with open and anonymous proxy servers. If I wanted to I could do this post and appear to be in Uzbekistan. It's not difficult if you RTFM. Someone could use two browsers, say IE and Firefox, and be logged into different identities using proxies on different continents. Masking yourself online does not require climbing a mountain of knowledge. The important point here is that of someone wants to be anonymous then they will be, and no matter what you try to do it will continue in a network that is interconnected across legal jurisdictions that often do not have cordial political relationship with each other. A rule set in Britain on identity will be meaningless if you bounce through Zimbabwe first.
One may not like anonymity, but it is a reality of the Net and on current trends always will be. There are simple answers to the “problem” though. Firstly, don't feed the trolls just ignore them (unless you’re bored of course). Second, if you're being harassed by email, filter the email address out, don't tell them, and they’ll be deleted before you even receive it – out of sight out of mind. Third, if you've got a commenter that is harassing you turn moderation on and deny all their comments, crucially don't bother telling them, you'll only end up in another debate. Whatever you do they will go ballistic because they hate you remember – you are the Admin, don’t forget it.
Fourth if you're being harassed on a bulletin board then stop posting. If you must go back to it because of the compulsive urge that can go with such things then re-register with a new nick and don't rise to the posts by the person you have a problem with. Last, but by no means least, always, and I mean always, remember this. The anonymous flamer in the open is easy to deal with and swot away. The ones you have to watch out for are the netiquette hypocrites that scream about bullying in the open whilst carrying out campaigns of harassments in private. They exploit the very online ethics they claim to hold so dear and they are the real problem.
If you find yourself facing one of these pious liars, then how you choose to deal with it is entirely up to you. Personally I like to endlessly bait them because there is little more enjoyable than seeing a Netiquette hypocrite bite and be too stupid to realise they've just been had. Anonymity isn’t a problem; it’s the ones who show themselves who create the genuine disharmony.
Thursday, November 01, 2007
Gordon "quick hands" Brown
He does move them about an awful lot doesn't he? But I never noticed how syncronised it was. I bet a body language expert could explain that one.
How long before they officially link our diet to climate change?
Yesterday evening when I picked the wife up from the train station I had been listening to the news on Radio 4. One of the first thing I said to her as a result was "apparently everything now causes cancer". A little exaggeration on my part of course, but that essentially seems to be the general conclusion of the report that leads the Times front page this morning (and other papers).
According to the BBC News report, whilst there are some in the emdical profession sceptical about the report, the Government has accepted it as part of its overall "cancer strategy". So what could that mean? Well having watched Channel 4 News, and seen a debate with some one from the meat industry and a doctor, the cynic rose in me and made a bold prediction.
You see, if you take a look at the track record of this Government and its desire to interfere in all our lives and protect us all from our own stupidty (thereby sending a message that it is the state, not us, that is responsible for our health outcomes), there is a simple conclusion of where this is going to lead isn't there? The Government is going to start promoting vegetarianism and/or veganism as the "approved" way of life.
OK, yes I'm being cynical, but I can't help remembering how in May this year the Daily Mail (ok, spit the dummy and laugh at the source and then read on) reported about an email that had been sent from an official at the Environment Agency which outlined a strategy for doing just that.
I could of course be totally and utterly wrong about this, but the politics of behaviour is the raison d'etre of this Government. They have accepted the premise that we're heading for fatty cancer-ridden doom as well planetary doom. Is it really that unlikely that they will link the debate up at some point?
Update: A commenter has drawn my attention to this article in the Guardian which says: "The health secretary, Alan Johnson, is convinced that two great challenges facing Britain - climate change and obesity - are linked."
According to the BBC News report, whilst there are some in the emdical profession sceptical about the report, the Government has accepted it as part of its overall "cancer strategy". So what could that mean? Well having watched Channel 4 News, and seen a debate with some one from the meat industry and a doctor, the cynic rose in me and made a bold prediction.
You see, if you take a look at the track record of this Government and its desire to interfere in all our lives and protect us all from our own stupidty (thereby sending a message that it is the state, not us, that is responsible for our health outcomes), there is a simple conclusion of where this is going to lead isn't there? The Government is going to start promoting vegetarianism and/or veganism as the "approved" way of life.
OK, yes I'm being cynical, but I can't help remembering how in May this year the Daily Mail (ok, spit the dummy and laugh at the source and then read on) reported about an email that had been sent from an official at the Environment Agency which outlined a strategy for doing just that.
The e-mail states: "It will be a case of introducing this gently as there is a risk of alienating the public majority." The official goes on to say it is "unlikely" that the Environment Agency would ever suggest adopting a fully vegan lifestyle. But the e-mail added: "Certainly encouraging people to examine their consumption of animal protein could be a key message."Now, the actual argument behind the email was not just the "health" issue but also that old chestnut climate change. After all, if we stop eating cows, sheep and pigs then there will be less cows, sheep and pigs farting. that means a reduction in methane which is seen as a major contributer to the theory of climate change along with CO2.
I could of course be totally and utterly wrong about this, but the politics of behaviour is the raison d'etre of this Government. They have accepted the premise that we're heading for fatty cancer-ridden doom as well planetary doom. Is it really that unlikely that they will link the debate up at some point?
Update: A commenter has drawn my attention to this article in the Guardian which says: "The health secretary, Alan Johnson, is convinced that two great challenges facing Britain - climate change and obesity - are linked."
Clegg attacks Huhne's unilateral nuclear armament plans?
Amusing Lib Dem coverage this morning, the Independent notes that Huhne is making a coded attack on Clegg about being a secret Tory, they also note that Huhne wants to drop the Lib Dem policy on extending the life of Trident and only maintain a minium deterrent, which is the opposite to Clegg.
This is where it gets funny though (at least in my warped little head), Clegg has written a piece for Lib Dem Voice which is a "coded attack" on Huhne's "minium nuclear deterrent" saying,
I don't know about you, but I'm confused now. Both scenarios result in Britain maintaining a nuclear deterrent, and yet each is trying to claim that he is in favour of disarmament as an end game and the other is somehow more belliscose. Bless!
This is where it gets funny though (at least in my warped little head), Clegg has written a piece for Lib Dem Voice which is a "coded attack" on Huhne's "minium nuclear deterrent" saying,
"I am dismayed by suggestions we should pre-empt the 2010 talks on the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty by planning to build a new, “smaller” nuclear weapons system. Building a new warhead would almost certainly be illegal under the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty; a treaty I would never permit Britain to breach.... I would never permit Britain to destabilise the international order by adopting more aggressive nuclear weapons."Got that? Cleeg wants to keep Trident, Huhne wants to get rid of it but perhaps have something smaller. Clegg says that Huhne wants a unilateral increase in nuclear weapons and that it will destablise the planet.
I don't know about you, but I'm confused now. Both scenarios result in Britain maintaining a nuclear deterrent, and yet each is trying to claim that he is in favour of disarmament as an end game and the other is somehow more belliscose. Bless!
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