I don't have time to check (sorry, shoddy I know but this is blogging not proper journalism), but I think this is the first year since 1997 that Brown hasn't addressed the TUC - he did of course address it last year. That in itself is rather shocking if it is so, and only serves to point to his current weakness and the fact he'd probably get a lukewarm reception at best. Even the super-loyal super-union Unite's support for Brown is getting lukewarm.

P.S. Thanks for the link, LabourMatters, but I'm a bloke! René is a boy's name, Renée a girl's, like Zellweger.

Rebel Labour MP Frank Field (pictured) has teamed up with senior Tories to demand a cap on the number of immigrants settling in Britain.

In a move that will alarm Downing Street, Field will tomorrow become the first prominent Labour figure to tackle Gordon Brown openly over the explosive issue of immigration.

I'm not sure if this will be seen as smacking of desperation, particularly in some Lancashire seats where the BNP has been gaining popularity, or whether Field sees a genuine economic and social case for applying stringent limits on those who end up taking permanent residence here.

It appears according to a report published by the European Commission that immigration is set to drive Britain's population to the highest in the EU and make us dreadfully overcrowded within two generations. It suggests that our population will outstrip Germany's and grow to 77 million within the next 50 years.

Tom Clougherty, the policy director at the Adam Smith Institute, said that the projected 25 per cent increase in Britain’s population would have a significant impact on infrastructure and public services. “The main implications will be for housing and transport, both of which are already in short supply,” he said.

“In the former, we have a market that is restricted by planning regulations, preventing developers from meeting demand, while in the latter there has been a lack of government investment.”

Public services would also come under strain. “In healthcare the rationing that we are seeing already is likely to get worse,” he said.

Labour has introduced an Australian points based system to help decide which non EU immigrants can reside here, yet after four years residence many do not return and settle here, in many cases illegally, adding to the problems of population growth and putting additional demands on services. Many would suggest that there are great economic benefits to be gained from immigration, and it seems that these benefits apply much to the immigrant and little to the economy in general other than suppressing labour costs. Daniel Finkelstein had an interesting article in The Times back in April which supported the case of his family and his forebears but warned not of the economic dangers, but of the risks to scial cohesion. And it is these fears which mainly need to be addressed.

I have often cited in this blog that South Shields, in particular, should be seen as a model for how social integration has succeeded in creating a multi cultural and multi ethnic community which by and large exists in harmony and helps to grow the local economy. In my lifetime I cannot recall any occasions when racial or ethnic tensions were an issue here. However, the risks involved in allowing current policies, which are akin to an open door, to continue are great and require a breathing space for all to consider the consequences. Finkelstein offers his thoughts in response to the House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs;

The Lords report suggests that the overall impact of immigration on GDP per head has been close to zero. But this doesn't mean the impact on every person in the country has been zero. Some may have increased their income, some not. If immigrants earn more than the average, then for existing residents income per head has gone down. But if immigrants earn less than the average it means income per head for existing residents has gone up. And don't you think this is more likely?

So, on the very figures in the report, immigration has probably resulted in an increase in the income per head of existing residents. Which, if you think about it, makes sense.

That should deal with the xenophobic reactions from the wild right.

And then there's the issue of unemployment. Does the report say that immigration causes unemployment for certain groups? Again, no. It merely concludes, after reviewing various studies, that “the available evidence is insufficient to draw clear conclusions about the impact of immigration on unemployment in the UK”. It did find a “small negative impact” on the wages of low-paid residents but said that a significant proportion of the losers are previous immigrants.

So given all this, what makes me such a strong proponent of immigration control? Not economics, but social cohesion.

It is here that he gets to the meat of his argument on why we should have a firm cap on immigration, and remember Finkelstein is from an immigrant family;

Human beings have evolved as co-operative creatures. The reason for this is that we have learnt that engaging in reciprocal acts of charity and compassion is a good biological strategy. But there is an unfortunate dark side to this. We reciprocate the altruism of those we expect to deal with again, those who will be in a position to return our favours. Towards others - strangers, those not in our clan - we have a tendency to be aggressive, even violent. Indeed, some of our co-operative strategies may have developed in order to allow us to outwit other clans.

Perhaps the most impressive part of the progress of civilisation has been the slow improvement in this tendency to violence against strangers. A study by the archaeologist Lawrence Keeley shows that the proportion of males killed in warfare in Europe and the US in the 20th century is vastly smaller than that killed in a wide range of ancient tribal societies over a similar period. Even taking account of two world wars.

Yet this progress is halting and the situation always delicate. Integrating strangers is hard for them and hard for the natives. It takes time, it has to be done sensitively. I believe it to be beneficial and I think our attitude should be liberal, tolerant, suffused with mutual respect.

This is made harder if we rush headlong into it, failing to stop along the way to ask permission, making changes so quickly we have no time to plan for them and no plan to adjust to them, adding new immigrants so fast that it makes the slow process of integration impossible.

That's the real problem, your Lordships.

So perhaps Field's efforts to bring the problem to centre stage may not appear to be so outlandish if we strip away the economic arguments (or lack of) and concentrate on the issues of social cohesion, it may not be a comfortable experience for Gordon Brown and his Labour government, but what is these days? However, the subject of immigration cannot be swept under the carpet using the old political fears created by the right wing lunatics of the BNP, serious debate needs to be entered into long before the UKs population balloons towards 77million, irrespective who and where the influx of new arrivals are coming from.

Resources and services are not infinite and rushing headlong into population growth will bring unbearable pressures to bear upon a social system not geared for such hefty demands.

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Fraser Kemp the Labour MP for Houghton and Washington East has decided that he's had enough, and announced that he will retire from Parliament at the next general election.

He is the third Sunderland MP to announce he will not be running when Prime Minister Gordon Brown calls the next general election. Colleagues Bill Etherington and Chris Mullin have already told the Labour party they are retiring from the House of Commons.

Mr Kemp, who represents Houghton and Washington East, said after nearly 30 years in full-time politics he had decided it was time to make his decision and give the party enough notice to choose a good candidate to replace him.

Cllr. Iain Malcolm the Leader of South Tyneside District Council, who has harboured ambitions of entering the Commons in the past, ought to get his pen and paper out and start writing those applications!

p.s. Fraser Kemp is actually younger than Curly, the picture suggests it was a "hard paper round."

Hat Tip - Iain Dale

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On the eve of the Trades Union Congress, Derek Simpson, joint general secretary of Unite, the union with the biggest group of Labour MPs at Westminster, accused Miliband, in a stream of swearwords, of being 'smug' and 'arrogant'.

In terms that caused fury on the right of the party, he also said Miliband would take the country back to the 'failings of Blairism' and could be a worse choice as Prime Minister than the Tory leader David Cameron. 'We might as well elect Cameron. We might be better off with Cameron,' he said. '

'Why should we elect a young fresh face when we have already got one in Cameron with policies that are not dissimilar?'

Simpson's officials, who sat in on the interview, immediately ordered that swearwords used to describe Miliband be taken 'off the record'. However, they confirmed that the robust anti-Miliband assault had been deliberate and should stand. Simpson said Gordon Brown should tell those who back Miliband's leadership ambitions, including Charles Clarke, who argued last week that Brown should consider stepping down 'with honour', to 'sod off'.

Union leaders and Labour MP's can huff and puff as much as they like, but the harsh reality is, this government has squandered much of the income it has gained as a consequence of the economic boom, higher taxes and borrowing. This means that the cupboard is bare. The union leaders crying foul, are the same people that fought and succeeded in getter higher wages for their members and in the process, supporting this government. The MP's bleating, are the same ones that thought the gravy train of higher taxes, followed by waste, was okay. They have themselves, New Labour values and specifically, this government to blame. So there is no point trying to convince us that you are fighting for the 'people' when you are as guilty as the rest for the position we all find ourselves in.

It is time to stop the whining and start thinking creatively. It is time to forget trying to fleece the ordinary taxpayer that has spent the last 11 years supporting those that cannot or will not work and propping this government allowing them to claim that they have successfully invested in our services, whilst failing to demonstrate any real tangible benefit to the majority.

The Labour government typically throw money and/or resource at problems in the hope that it will fix the problem, or at least provide a brief respite, perhaps with some good headlines. Their spendthrift ways have lumbered this country with an enormous mountain of debt, which includes official borrowings of £450bn and another £170bn that needs to be paid between now and 2032 on PFI schemes. This ignores the £800bn or so shortfall in government pension schemes. In fact, it is an utter mess, and demonstrates what a tardy bunch this government is. Many of the foolish press barons have hailed Gordon Brown as a prudent or successful chancellor, history will judge him differently.

With nothing in the kitty, 'working' taxpayers are so highly taxed through direct, indirect and stealth taxes introduced by this government and with realborrowings at an all time high, there is little room to manoeuvre, even for a government adept at screwing every last penny from the rest of us. Now is the time for new ideas, a bold approach, creativity and above all honesty.

Windfall taxes are a 'one off' short term measure with long term consequences, given the energy companies will get the money back somewhere, either by reducing necessary investment, increasing energy cost for the majority, or, most likely a combination of the two. Similarly, throwing money at the problem, assuming we had any, in the guise of fuel credits is knee-jerk and would then be expected every year. The answer is investment in ways to reduce energy consumption through insulation, energy saving appliances and bulbs and other such measures. Estimates suggest that these measures could reduce our energy bills by up to 35%.

The government should encourage the energy companies to invest their carbon credits in the UK rather than elsewhere. They should be incentivised, rather than bullied into offering more support for the Warm Front programme and the government should put back the money they withdrew from the scheme. The energy companies should, however, be forced, by legislation if necessary, to offer the so called 'social tariffs' to all those in need and should be prevented from charging higher tariffs for meters on non-direct debit customers. The energy companies have dragged their feet on social tariffs and the penal rates they charge people who use pre-payment meters, this in unacceptable. The regulator should be given more powers to mandate and control issues such as access to social tariffs as well as price rises.

The government then needs to be more creative. Lets face it, at a time like this, everyone needs to pull together. Those in fuel poverty should be encouraged to help themselves, not simply come along to the government expecting more money, which the rest of us will have to pay. Ordinary working families, whether they fall inside or outside the fuel poverty trap are feeling the pinch. Many have had to reduce their expenditure on non-essentials in order that they can meet the higher fuel prices, higher costs in getting to and from work, higher food prices, higher mortgage costs and higher local taxes. They too are suffering, even though they are working, some, many have had to also take on a part-time job in order that they can meet their obligations and keep their head above water. What of these people, the taxpayers that make it possible to support so many that are not working or are retired, don't they matter?

No solution is going to be perfect, but you can be damned certain, that chucking borrowed money that this country doesn't have at the problem is going to be much worse. Here are some ideas the government could consider.

1. Determine which of those in 'fuel poverty' are capable of helping themselves with government assistance or encouragement and which are not.
2. Allow those on fixed incomes, such as lone parents, disability allowances and the unemployed to take on a part-time job (stacking shelves, land work, cleaning houses etc) and retain the income, free of tax, national insurance and, most importantly benefit deductions. The limit for this extra income should be set at a level equivalent to what the government believes is the additional cost of living as a consequence of food and energy increases.
3. Allow those in 'fuel poverty' and in receipt of some form of 'tax credit' to earn an additional income through a part-time job, free of tax and national insurance, albeit up to a pre-determined limit, set by the government or better still, experts!
4. Remove VAT and any other forms of duties on items that are routinely used to save energy, such as, energy saving bulbs, insulation, gas boilers and so on.
5. Reduce the amount of paperwork pensioners have to complete in order that they can take on a part-time job. Provide them with an additional 'work credit' whereby they can earn up to a pre-determined amount, free of tax and national insurance contribution, without affecting their pensions. Increase the work credit by an amount equal to each allowance they do not claim, such as the 'winter fuel payment', the savings could be reinvested.
6. Stop paying the winter fuel allowance to pensioners that no longer reside in the UK and reinvest this money into support for the most needy or energy saving measures.
7. Provide, if necessary, secured short-term, interest free loans to private landlords, housing associations and local authorities to allow them to bring properties under their control up to acceptable standards in terms of energy efficiency. - A large proportion of homes that need upgrading are in the private sector.

The policy of assuming that there will always be enough taxpayers that can be fleeced to support those that are actually capable of helping themselves in times of need has to stop, it is not sustainable. Yes, if they cannot work, through a genuine disability, age, or lack of mobility then we should offer support, but if they can help themselves, why should they get away scotfree whilst the rest of us pick up the tab through higher taxes and having to take on extra jobs? It is time to view the so called priviledged not as a gravy train, but as the conduit through which those less fortunate can have a better existence.

The truth is, many of those that are capable of helping themselves, probably would if they are in dire straits. However, New Labour has exercised and grown this culture of state intervention, the government will always come to the aid of those less well off. Little or no effort is put into finding out whether they can or are willing to help themselves. If someone on benefit tries to get a part-time job to cover the additional energy costs, they can expect to lose the equivalent amount in state benefits. Why, where is the incentive? I am not suggesting that we should let people abuse the system, just that they are encouraged to help themselves, within limits that relate to their assessed additional needs.

Similarly pensioners are penalised if they work part-time. Clobbered with paperwork and additional taxes, encourage them, don't penalise them. Government should look to incentivise, cajole and if necessary bully people into helping themselves, rather than transferring the burden onto overburdened taxpayers who are suffering just as badly.

Okay, I accept there are flaws and risks in some of my suggestions, but then I am not an economist or a civil servant. What I do possess is commonsense and a desire to be constructive in my criticism, the former is something the government lacks and the latter something the opposition parties lack. At least my suggestions are a start, perhaps those better qualified than myself can come up with working proposals that encourage those that need help to do more for themselves, thereby reducing the burden on existing taxpayers already facing pressure on their own finances.

They're not beyond selling their principles to the highest bidder, lying, cheating, treating the electorate with contempt, shitting on their colleagues, sleeping with the enemy (or anything else with a hole) and even pretending they care - yes they really do believe their own bullshit!

Mr Monkey reckons Councillors Iain Malcolm and I'll shag anything, David Potts fit the bill perfectly.

CLICK HERE to see what they really get up to. 

If you've enjoyed this week's Monkey Clip click here, here and here to view some of Mr Monkey's previous Monkey Clips.

He draws on his own experience as an MP in the 1980s to argue that "the most pressing thing on the minds of most Labour MPs this weekend is their own majority at the next election, not their party's" - and hence that most would rather cling on to another two years in the Commons than risk an early election by dumping Brown, even if the early election produced a less catastrophic result for Labour than appears inevitable by 2010. As Parris writes:

Dr Johnson is wrong. The prospect of being hanged in two weeks does not concentrate the mind. It numbs. Paralysed like a rabbit before a snake by that ticking “time still to go” clock in the corner of the screen, your brain is drained of deeper thoughts.

And so it will be this morning for hundreds of Labour MPs. Few will have much confidence that, after the spring of 2010, there will be any kind of employment that would pay better than the £90,000 or so to which a backbencher's salary effectively amounts, including expenses. 2010 is the wall, the void.

Indeed, these are the thoughts which Brown's dwindling band of loyalists will be pressing on doubtful MPs: "It's still only 2008. With Gordon, you're totally secure until 2010. Who knows what may turn up in the interim?"

However, Parris argues that Labour's predicament has now developed into a national "emergency", as Britain heads into recession with a "doomed and flailing leadership at the helm". Moreover, the long-term survival of the Labour party, and the integrity and reputation of centre-left politics in UK, depend on action being taken now rather than after Cameron has won his landslide:

The Parliamentary Labour Party, the party nationwide and the trade union movement, should be asking themselves how the 20 months ahead are going to look to an emerging generation and to history.

How would paralysis reflect on a political movement with claims to a future in the new century? How proud they are going to feel about the way they handled the recognition that, at a dangerous time at home and abroad, their party had landed itself with the most inept and directionless Prime Minister in British history; and with nearly two years left to go.

As Parris continues:

This is about more than electoral arithmetic. It's about showing that a party has a heart, a mind and stomach for a fight; that it can stir itself in an emergency.

As for the wider left, beyond the confines of the Labour movement itself, a similar paralysis has taken hold:

[W]here are the voices raised from the Left, prepared to acknowledge this spasm, and distinguish between the failure of an individual, and the failure of an ideology? Is Polly Toynbee almost on her own? Has the whole centre left project lost its self-belief, taking refuge only in days, hours and minutes left profitlessly in office?

As Parris concludes, what Labour needs is to think about its future in opposition, and the need it will then face for:

a leader then who can hold his head up and say that he didn't hold back, waiting for someone else to show some guts.

• The smell of death around this government is so overpowering it seems to have anaesthetised them all. One bungle follows another and yet those about to die sit silently by.
• The ineptitude of Brown's Downing Street worsens by the week. The shrinking band of those he trusts are now his old rottweilers, who shred what's left of their leader's reputation. This week when they mauled Alistair Darling...
• .....the government now negotiates like a highwayman without a gun. What's to negotiate?
• The stamp duty holiday is a bad mistake - all too characteristic of the prime minister. It's an expensive way to entice first-time buyers into negative equity, as all predictions are of steeper falls in house price.
• A cabinet of minnows and spineless backbenchers include many - perhaps most - who want Brown gone, but lack the nerve to act. They wait for someone else, for Brown to walk away or for a proverbial bus to save them from the task.
• Soon Cameron's lead will be gold-plated, his succession virtually inevitable.
• Already power, money, glamour, foreign interest and attention flock to Cameron in a political tide whose undertow knocks Labour off its feet with every wave.
• The 10p tax band abolition to bribe the better off was a wickedness entirely of his own devising. Letting rip the disastrous house price boom was him, as was letting top earnings soar unchecked while reckless banks had "light-touch regulation" and public sector workers were pinned to below-inflation pay.
• Unseating a prime minister is very high risk - but a dying party should be ready to take dangerous medicine if that's the last chance left.

Crikey!

Things must be bad, these are not the words of some neurotic right wing neocon, but the Guardian's Brownite acolyte-in-chief Polly Toynbee.

Nuff said.

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Whilst most people would agree with the old adage "prevention is better than cure", and that in the  long-term it would be good for people to properly insulate their homes so as not to waste energy; the announcement by the Government that it would not to hit the energy companies with a 'windfall' tax to help the most needy of society, but rather that the Energy companies merely invest in helping customers reduce there energy bills by insulating their homes shows again that he has no idea of what the public want.

Some problems with the decision,

• The government cannot launch anything without a green paper, a white paper or toilet paper,
• They cannot launch anything quickly, NHS computerised system, Bill of Rights Act etc.
• They cannot launch anything that is easy to use (deliberately in my view), an example would be Tax Credits,
• That it is well known that many benefits remain un-paid because of the complexity of the claim process.
• There are not enough trained insulation technicians which would mean long delays in actually getting your house insulated,
• The energy companies, at best, will not enthusiastically embrace this initiative, why should they there is no financial incentive, on the contrary, the fewer people who take up the offer the less money it costs them, and those that don't take up the offer continue to pay extortionate fuel bills.

So once again the PM looks at the long-term solution (and so he should) one that will not be able to be put into effect for one to two years, but forgets - more importantly - the short-term issues of extortionately high fuel bills, rising inflation, pending recession, rising food bills, rising job losses and the collapse of the housing market.  Issues that are affecting people NOW!

There should be no long-term solution to Gordon Brown, he needs to go NOW. 

Cynical-Bastard

For more go to : http://cynical-bastard.spaces.live.com/

THE UK GOVERNMENT ALLOWS UK CITIZENS TO BE EXTRADITED EVEN WHEN THEY HAVE BEEN CONVICTED IN THEIR ABSENCE TO FACE JAIL TERMS WITHOUT ANY CHANCE OF APPEAL OR RE-TRIAL.

Brown pretends to be tough on Russia
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/4475
Posted by Jerome a Paris on September 3, 2008

Prime Minister Gordon Brown, is trying to reassert his authority on the cheap, by publishing an anti-Russian diatribe in today's Guardian (a left-leaning newspaper). It's an impressive exercise in weasel words and tough-sounding emptiness.

Before I take you through it in detail below the fold, let me note again that this sets the tone for public discourse on the topic. Newspapers, even if they have different information on the underlying conflict, have to report the aggressive declarations by Brown and others, and cannot fail to paint that as increased tension with Russia. As Russia responds (and it often does in rather unsubtle ways), reality follows discourse, further inflames it, and the whole process takes a life of its own. Pundits, even well intentioned ones, can then go on to pontificate about evil Russia and a small number of concepts, such as the "energy weapon", enter public lore and become "acquired concepts" (I'm tempted to write "acquired conceits") even when the facts on the ground are rather different.

But by then, the Mission has been Accomplished: the discussion is no longer about our failing energy policies (or rather, the lack thereof), or about our leaders' incompetence, but about the Enemy which wants to hurt us and against which We Must Stand Firm (Behind our Beloved and Fearless Leaders).

I understand our leaders trying this: after all, this is all they have to run on. But why, oh why, does our media have to fall for it hook, line and sinker?

This is how we will stand up to Russia's naked aggression
As European leaders meet, the Prime Minister says security is linked to the politics of energy

"We will stand up" to "Russia's naked aggression" - the stage is set. Once you've read the title, you know how it's going to be, there's really no need to go beyond. We are going to be provided with an enemy, and fearless leaders to fight it. And we know that this is what goes on TV - you get the headline and the subheader as "comment" by the talking heads. Evil Russia is stealing our energy and making us pay dearly for it and We Will Not Tolerate It.

Twenty years ago, as the Berlin Wall fell, people assumed the end of hostility between East and West, and a new world order founded on common values. As part of this, 10 Eastern European states joined Nato and intensified co-operation with Europe and more wanted to follow. But Russia's hostile action towards Georgia suggests that they are unreconciled to this new reality. Their aggression raises two urgent questions for us: how best to stabilise Georgia now, and how to make it clear to Russia that its unilateral approach is dangerous and unacceptable. War in Georgia also poses a serious longer term issue - how can we best create a rules-based international system that protects our collective security and safeguards our shared values?

Sigh... Where to begin? This is history rewriting on a grand scale...

• our "common values" are embedded, if anywhere, in the Council of Europe, of which 47 countries are members, including (to quite a bit of debate in the 90s, as the wars in Chechnya raged on) Russia. NATO does not represent "common values", it is a military organisation created to defend its members against the Warsaw Pact*, as run from Moscow. Its explicit - and still sole, despite desperate efforts to change that - raison d'être is to prepare for war with Russia. Making that organisation, rather than the Council of Europe or, more prosaically, the European Union, the embodiment of our values, speaks volumes - as does Brown's failure to even mention the EU in that paragraph...

• bam, out of the blue, Russia decided to attack poor weak Georgia. No mention of how this conflict originated in the short term (a Georgian attack), no discussion of the complex past history of South Ossetia (whether you look at the last 15 years or the past 2 centuries) - and no reference whatsoever to our policies towards Russia (bringing NATO to Russia's borders, cancelling the ABM treaty, ignoring them on Kosovo, just to note recent events). Nope. We're the good guys, they are the bad guys. It is so because we say so, we, the good guys.

• as to creating a "rules-based international system" - how about, you know, us actually following the rules that already apply to us under the existing international system? Like not invading countries on a whim? Not deciding on our own which separatist provinces deserve independence from the countries they are a part of and which don't? Not threatening attack on various others because they do things we don't like? It is legitimate for organisations that focus on international rights or human rights and criticize our own failings to criticize Russia for its patchy record; it is quite another thing to hear the same from governments that engage in the exact same behavior they criticize at this very moment!

At tomorrow's European summit in Brussels we will first unite to alleviate the suffering of the 100,000 Georgian civilians left without homes. The UK has already pledged £2m, and I will urge partners to meet not only Georgia's immediate needs but its long-term reconstruction and development needs. We will deploy peace monitors to better judge violations of the ceasefire, appoint a senior figure to drive the humanitarian and political effort, and support the Nato Georgia Commission, with a Nato team sent to Georgia.

Ooooh. 2 million pounds?! How amazingly generous. That's sure going to help. But never mind, let's create more "Nato Georgia" thingies that take a life of their own, can be ignored if needed (hey, you don't actually want us to fight against Russia's army, do you?), but help create the perception in the meantime that we're standing by our proud new ally against the evil invaders. Let's keep NATO on the forefront, and sneakily suggest that the EU is doing NATO's bidding (note that the EU is still not mentioned: a "European summit" is nicely ambiguous in that respect).

Georgia has felt the consequences of the conflict. It is important that the summit also demonstrates to Russia that its actions have real consequences.

Hmmm... I look forward to such a demonstration...

No one wants a new Cold War or the encirclement of Russia.

Let's deny the obvious. I find it particularly noteworthy that Brown feels ready to acknowledge the "encirclement of Russia": that means that this (i) is the reality and (ii) that it will be pushed further. It's denied, so those that say it's happening can now be dismissed as lackeys of Russia, unserious, cowards or any combination thereof as said encirclement proceeds further (or attempts to anyway).

But when I spoke to President Medvedev yesterday, I told him to expect a determined European response. As David Miliband has said, there can be no return to 'business as usual' unless and until Russia commits fully to Georgia's territorial integrity and withdraws to its previous positions.

Ooooh. He talked to Medvedev! (not to Putin?) In a stern tone! To tell him to do something he is clearly not doing (having recognized South Ossetia's independence) or ... or else! The "demonstration" stepping up... to the naive public at home.

Russia has emerged as a significant economic power, with its trade increasing fourfold. It has done so by reaping the benefits of a stable global order based on agreements that make trade and investment both possible and profitable, bringing greater stability and certainty to international relations.

Yes, Russia's rising prosperity is clearly due to agreements that make trade profitable (codewords for the WTO. As we know, trade is always profitable and must be expanded) but to which it is not yet a party. It has nothing to do with the higher prices for its main exports (oil, gas and metals) or with the relative stability imposed by Putin and his KGB cronies in lieu of the chaos of the Yeltsin years. No, anything good that happens to Russia has to be claimed by the West's neoliberal policies. Not only we're the good guys (ie everything we do is good by definition), but everything that's good anywhere can and should be credited to us too. Others are, well, othery and cannot, also by definition, do any good. Life can be so simple.

Equally, when Russia fights secessionist movements in Chechnya or Dagestan, it expects others to respect its territorial integrity and not to recognise declarations of independence.

Hmmm.... Let's not mention the fact that we didn't really care about Chechnya back then, because we still had access to Russia's oil&gas resources then ("we" being the Western oil majors, of course). In fact, I distinctly remember that in 1999-2001, in the early years of Putin's presidency, the UK and US had rather friendly relationships with Russia, whereas France was in a really tense one as its government (well, what do you expect from 35-hour-promoting socialists) and media were rather vocal about Chechnya - an attitude that was mostly criticised by the Anglos as needlessly disturbing business.

So when Russia has a grievance over an issue such as South Ossetia, it should act multilaterally by consent rather than unilaterally by force. I believe Russia faces a choice about the nature of its responsibilities as a leading and respected member of the international community. My message to Russia is simple: if you want to be welcome at the top table of organisations such as the G8, OECD and WTO, you must accept that with rights come responsibilities. We want Russia to be a good partner in the G8 and other organisations, but it cannot pick and choose which rules to adhere to.

Ack. Again, where to start? Bullet points ahoy: here we go again!

• "it should act multilaterally by consent rather than unilaterally by force," says the head of the government of one of the countries that invaded Iraq despite being told in no uncertain that the invasion was not approved by the UN Security council? Who the fuck does he think he is kidding? (Sad answer: a lot of people, including most of our pundit class);

• more to the specific point, Russia actually went to the Security Council on 8 August to ask for international intervention, as Georgian troops were attacking South Ossetian with heavy artillery. They followed the existing diplomatic procedures, but their claims were ignored or rejected.

• Russia is a member of the G8, an increasingly pointless body, is not a member of the OECD (described by the Economist as a "think tank"), nor one of the WTO (its membership having been blocked for years by the USA for reasons totally unrelated to the current crisis). What's the value of these carrots, exactly, after years of dangling them in front of the Kremlin's eyes and denying them, or emptying them of their substance?

• "it cannot pick and choose which rules to adhere to" - nope, that's only a prerogative of the Good Guys. (I mean, that's the only way to make sense of what would otherwise be breathtaking double standards).

That is why I will argue tomorrow that Russia should accept Georgia's territorial integrity and international mechanisms for addressing these conflicts, and withdraw troops to their previous positions. And, in the light of Russian actions, the EU should review - root and branch - our relationship with Russia. We should continue to strengthen the transatlantic relationship and may need to meet more regularly as the G7. We are also reflecting on the Nato response. We must re-evaluate the alliance's relationship with Russia, and intensify our support to Georgia and others who may face Russian aggression.

So the thing to do if we are unhappy with Russia is to "strengthen the transatlantic relationship", ie to fall in line even more rigidly behind Washington's (provenly toxic) positions? Doesn't this sound like hiding in mama's skirt (or rather, behind papa's big fists) in a schoolyard fight one started?

More interestingly, this is where we see the absolute cowardice in Brown's position: more regular meetings of the G7 means that there won't actually be a confrontation with Russia about its membership in the G8, just more meaningless meetings without Evil Russians to pretend that we're "standing up to them" (safely from a distance). And "reflecting" on NATO's response. That has to be the lamest, weakest line - in diplo-speak, it means, basically, "please stop hitting us, we agree to everything, just give us the time to set our ties properly before we say yes!"

But, as we know, the target here is not Russia, it's the public over here, and what matters is the repetition, yet again, of the words "Russian aggression," along with more calls for "Atlanticism", ie deciding to not have a common European position and impose division by preemptively aligning with the extremist position coming from Washington. Bluster, posturing and empty threats that look so manly.

The strangest part is that Russia responds, mostly with surprise, by pointing out that this is empty bluster - and this is taken as yet more aggression (they are contradicting, or worse, mocking, our leaders again!) rather than at simple face value. Clearly they do not play the same game.

No nation can be allowed to exert an energy stranglehold over Europe and the events of August have shown the critical importance of diversifying our energy supply.

Hmmm... Right after "Russian aggression" comes energy. Again, the target is not Russia, but the uninformed public and the naive punditry. As far as I can remember, the war did not cause any disruption in supply - indeed, as the tension between Russia and Georgia built up and turned into actual war, oil prices were collapsing... (for other reasons, but still). The markets obviously took a pretty relaxed view of the impact of this conflict on energy supplies. And the markets are always right, as Brown himself endlessly reminds us (and indeed he will do so before this article is over).

Some pipelines were temporarily cut as conflict raged, but the significance of that is rather different from what pundits might think. The Baku-Supsa oil pipeline was closed, but this was significant only insofar as the much larger Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline had been closed the week before (because of events in Turkey which were, as far as I can tell, totally unrelated to the Georgian crisis) and the route to Supsa was used as a substitute. The Baku-Erzurum gas pipeline, which follows the same route, was also closed, but that pipeline only supplies Turkey with small volumes of gas. Despite multiple claims by the Georgians to that effect, the pipelines were not attacked by Russia (something that BP, which operates all of them, confirmed repeatedly) - but that, of course, did not prevent pundits from saying it did happen (or that it "could" have happened), nor of falsely linking the overall closure of the BTC pipeline to the Russian intervention.

The result is again, "Russian aggression" and "pipeline closed" being closely associated in everybody's minds. And hey, "energy stranglehold" and "Russia" in the same sentence is all good - it takes attention away from "energy" and "European policies" (or the lack thereof).

The tenfold increase in the world oil price in the past decade has demonstrated that diversification from oil is also an economic necessity.

A rare sane sentence in that article - the content of which will of course be ignored as that apparent sanity is used for other purposes than actually solving problems.

The UK will go from being 80 per cent self-sufficient now to having to import almost two-thirds of our gas and more than half of our oil by 2020 - precisely as markets become more volatile as more people chase fewer natural resources. And with states such as Russia increasingly using their energy resources as policy tools it is apparent that the security grounds for this shift are stronger as well.

So, as long as the UK had enough oil for itself, all was fine, and all discussion of energy dependency was unnecessary (yes, I distinctly remember mockery coming from across the channel and directed at the many continental European countries that worried about long term supplies in the not so distant past). But now that the UK is running out of oil and gas for itself, it becomes an overwhelming issue that hysterically drives everything away - and has to be imposed on the rest of Europe - which are cowards if they don't join in.

Without urgent action we risk sleepwalking into an energy dependence on less stable or reliable partners.

That sentence would be correct with another verb tense: "without action we sleepwalked into an energy dependence on less stable or reliable partners." The dependence is already there: oil is now mostly controlled by countries that fit that description, and any one of a dozen of them can wreak havoc on the global market by withholding production. Think Saudi Arabia or Russia, of course, but also Iran, Venezuela, Nigeria, Angola, Kuwait - or, more interestingly, China, Norway, Iraq or Brazil - or the USA. Any country that can take a million barrels per day of capacity from the global market can cause a massive price hike. The impact of Gustav in the coming days could give yet another demonstration of that state of fact.

And an important point to note is that oil produced in the UK or the US does not belong to UK citizens or the US citizens, it belongs to the oil companies that have acquired the rights to the relevant fields - and they can do whatever they want with that oil, starting with selling it to the highest bidder. Which means, of course, that even a self-sufficient country's citizens will need to pay the full market price for oil, just like the citizens of oil-poor countries: neither owns any oil reserves...

As to gas, its reserves are even more concentrated than those of oil, with Russia, Iran and Qatar controlling over two thirds of the total. And there is no global market, as gas only goes where infrastructure, ie pipelines and LNG terminals, will take it - under the long term contracts that such infrastructure requires to be financed and built. So gas, in a very practical sense, belongs as much to those that have long term supply rights at the end of the pipeline as to those that actually have the reserves. In that case, the dependency goes both ways, and the partners have a serious incentive to deliver - and indeed Russia has: it certainly has been a highly reliable supplier over the past 40 years, even through the Soviet period, the break-up of the Soviet Union and the chaos that followed.

That is why we in the UK are putting in law our commitment to cut CO2 emissions by 60 per cent by 2050, looking to replace our ageing nuclear power plants, to encourage greener fuels to power our homes and businesses and to transform the way we travel.

Nice non sequitur. Let's remind people that we're also pretending to be green, and that this supposedly helps on the separate problem of oil use. Let's provide a further gentle push for nukes (which provide electricity, not transport, today) and biofuels (which are an absurdity from every perspective in Europe) and altogether pretend we have policies in place, without ever mentioning demand reduction or even energy efficiency.

Europe also needs to take action.

Oh yeah, let's pretend too that the UK are leaders, and that (the rest of) Europe has done nothing on the energy front for all these years. The arrogance and hubris is, as usual, breathtaking.

Tomorrow's summit must add urgency to the work on Europe's energy agenda. We must more rapidly build relationships with other producers of oil and gas. Our response must include a redoubling of our efforts to complete a single market in gas and electricity, a collective defence to secure our energy supplies.

Sigh... The single market, as I wrote in the FT last year, encourages market players to invest in gas-fired plants, as they are easier to finance and less risky in the short term. Gas-fired plants mean more demand, for a very long time, for the very gas that we are warned Russia threatens to withhold from us. Even if we find alternate suppliers (would Earlier Evil Country Iran do, if they were ever in a position to export gas?), would it not be a better bet to, you know, not increase our demand for gas? The fact that this question is not even touched by Brown demonstrates, more than anything else, that he is not interested in solutions but in finding scapegoats to blame and to use to rebuild his reputation for toughness and decisiveness.

And, if I may be impertinent once more, what exactly does he mean by "building relationships with other suppliers?" Entering into long term supply contracts? Building infrastructure that links their supplies with our markets via an unbreakable physical link? (you know, what Germany, Italy and France have done with Russia) Or invading them, rewriting their oil laws, and giving away their reserves to oil majors (which, as Iraq amply demonstrates, does not work, as the locals usually get uppity when they see that they are being looted)?

I will also be pressing European leaders to increase funding for a project to allow us to source energy from the Caspian Sea, reducing our dependence on Russia.

BTC already exists, thank you very much. There is no gas available in the Caspian (even including Iran) to make a pipeline from over there worthwhile unless it is filled with Russian gas. Nabucco is a non-starter, if its goal is to avoid Russian gas. But hey, let's keep on repeating "Nabucco, Nabucco, Nabucco" like a mantra, and discreetly pushing the completion date by a year each year, so as to look like we're finding other sources of gas.

I will encourage European partners to use our collective bargaining power rather than seek separate energy deals with Russia. And because the environmental necessity is urgent, we must deliver an ambitious 2020 climate and energy package by the end of this year.

Again, will anybody EVER tell me what a common bargaining position towards Russia would be? And how would it be determined? According to energy consumption? To gas consumption? To gas imports? To gas imports from Russia? And, presuming that a joint position is reached, what will happen, beyond merging into one giant EU-Russia contract the relatively small number of existing bilateral contracts? A better price? (What would be better? A different index to oil? A non-indexation to oil? Who will decide what price formula is most advantageous?) And if a "better" price is obtained compared to the existing framework, who gets the difference? But, more generally, what will prevent Russia to use the "energy weapon" against Europe any better than it can prevent it against France or Germany? How will gas be allocated in the case of cuts by Russia?

As long as nobody even makes suggestions to all these questions, these ideas for a "common negotiating position" towards Russia are just pointless blather, bluster and, more to the point, a distraction.

More than 10 years ago Alexander Solzhenitsyn - who died just days before this latest chapter in the history of his country - wrote: 'We were recently entertained by a naive fable of the happy arrival of the end of history, of the overflowing triumph of an all-democratic bliss; the ultimate global arrangement had supposedly been attained. But we all see and sense that something very different is coming, something new, and perhaps quite stern. No, tranquility does not promise to descend on our planet, and will not be granted us so easily.' The past few days have seen some of his predictions realised.

Meh. I have not found the original quote, but I'm pretty sure that he did not have Russia in mind when he wrote this - but rather the USA. (Accurate info here welcomed)

This is why the changing global order cannot be governed by institutions designed in the middle of the last century. We now know how much more we have to do to create an effective system of international rules. We must strengthen the system of global governance to meet the challenges of our interdependent world. We must reshape our global architecture to meet the new challenges: climate change, energy security, poverty, migration. And in doing so we must stand up for both our vital interests and our essential values.

Another non sequitur. I'm sure that the institutions Brown has in mind have only one member with veto rights, and he's so proud that he has the right phone number to know beforehand when the veto will be used.

:: ::

Mr Brown: in order to stand up to your values, you must be true to them. In order to stand up for your vital interests, you have to ensure that you actually have those interests (and not those of a very small subset of the people you claim to represent) at heart.

But again, this is not about policies. They're pathetic. This is about politics, and stories. And Brown is selling the irresistible story of the good guys standing up to the evil enemy that seems to be threatening us. That this is distracting us from policy is not an unwanted side effect, it is the very purpose of articles like this one.

but if nobody calls him on it, then ... it works. And it gets repeated by people, like Jeremy Leggett, an otherwise respected peak oiler, and it gets legitimized even in otherwise skeptical crowds. (This post is already long enough as it stands, but you can read my debunking of Leggett's article here).

Meanwhile, our aggressive grandstanding is fast alienating Russia, which might one day wonder why we think we have a God-Given Right to receive any of the gas under their tundra. The mindless posturing has very real consequences in the real world.

Bleh.

Jerome Guillet

But is he cool?

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"It came the day after the company raised gas prices for 10 million households by 35 per cent.

"The average annual gas bill for British Gas customers is now more than £1,300 and it emerged yesterday that the four million customers paying by direct debit will see an increase of 42 per cent on their annual bill.

"However, shareholders are set to enjoy a 16 per cent jump in their dividend pay outs." - Daily Telegraph, 05/09/2008.

And yet Brown, terrified of upsetting the bloated capitalists, insults working class people by rejecting a windfall tax on the fuel companies' huge profits, and getting young Benn to lecture us about having our lofts insulated! This after having slashed the "Warm Front" scheme!

'Unite''s Tony Woodley is, of course, 100 per cent correct when he says that the poor and the elderly will die as a result of Brown's grovelling to big business. But what will Woodley do about it? Threaten to withold finance from the Labour Party? After all, that's all he can do, if he means business, and can persuade the rest of 'Unite' and the seriously unhinged Derek Simpson, to agree to take action.

Remarks by Vice President Cheney and President Saakashvili of Georgia After Meeting in Tblisi

From the snake's mouth: How the US was, is and will be propping up Georgia

Army: soldier suicide rate may set record again - Most people don't understand what it's like in a highly dangerous combat environment where violence is the daily routine. Seeing other soldiers raping mothers and holding guns to the father's heads, shooting mothers in the head walking down the street, the child made an instant orphan, whole crowds mowed down by high-caliber weapons. And no one wanting to go to to get all that stopped. It is incredibly stressful, and you have to be on the inside to truly understand it and empathize with these guys. Sure, they signed up for it, but it is way more difficult to get out than in. Much like the Mob and CIA, both the same organization at the higher levels.

Pentagon to shift forces to Afghanistan - It's starting....

N Korea's Kim died in 2003; replaced by lookalike, says Japanese professor

U.S. appeals to Ukraine to unite with West

Moldovan splinter territory Transdniestria lifts moratorium on contacts with Moldova - At the czar's decree.

Transdniestria: Russia and Moldova's Secret Deal

Al Qaida warns of more Denmark attacks in new video

Gordon Brown asked by Former Home Secretary Charles Clarke to step down with honor

Obama secretly met with Fox News executives - Hillary Clinton still meets with Roger Ailes for hours each week. Big dinner, no one knows what's going on. This should be instant disqualification for the presidency in any nation daring to call itself free. A presidential candidate meeting with the media before an election? I can't believe this.

Never mind whether Sarah Palin has or hasn't the ability to do the job, or to succeed Mr McCain, should the need arise.

But bravo! What a fabulous point!

All parents with disabled children should basically stay home instead of taking professional opportunities that come their way.

By this account, Gordon Brown, the UK's Prime Minister, should go home because he and his wife have a child with Cystic Fibrosis. But he is the primary bread-earner in his family so may be he needs to keep working.

Not just that, David Cameron, the Conservative Party leader, should also stay home because he and his wife too have a child with cereberal palsy and severe epilepsy at home. Besides, unlike Mr Brown's wife, David Cameron's wife, who is the Creative Director of Smythson, earns way more than he does. And together they have quite a lot of inherited wealth. I mean it is not as if they need to work!

Perhaps it is worth a mention that these two families, a bit like Sarah Palin's, have two parents providing back-up and support to each other, emotionally, financially and physically. But that is a minor point. They are as free to choose their careers, as they are to choose their childcare arrangements or familial situations.

Here is what I think.

We need, in larger numbers, public figures who have physically or mentally disabled children. We need them in Number 10 and in the White House. We need them to use the National Health Service or privatised healthcare so they know how the ordinary person with a disabled child lives.

But above all, we need them in large numbers because they would help bring the disability issue from under the carpet into the mainstream:

Into the mainstream of political debate, where the rights of the disabled to live a full life are recognised and institutionalised;

Into the mainstream of the corporate world, which can get away with shunning disabled people from the workforce;

And into the mainstream of society, because we really need to do more than to condemn the parent of a disabled child to a solitary life of "responsible parenting".

Related reading:

Much ado about a potentially disabled foetus

Does 'disabled' have to mean 'invisible'?

Some time ago, in the face of utility companies, energy suppliers in particular, banking inordinate profits the government was considering imposing a windfall tax which would then be used to fund pay-outs to the poorest households in the country. An alternative, capping the profit level of these companies, was mentioned but never got a sideways look into the government agenda. The profiteers' response was to protest and insist they must protect their profits to ensure future investment and developments – just how that works out or for whose benefit was never explained, but maybe that doesn't matter. The energy companies put their prices up by the most proportions imaginable last year and got away with it, it worked, people paid up, they liked what they saw, did it again this year and are now wallowing in money.

The government has now changed its tune and is saying they will not go for 'short term gimmicks or give-aways' but have been 'working hard' and 'focusing' on long term measures which will provide households with permanent fuel efficiency e.g. loft insulation. Precisely how you work hard at focusing on loft insulation takes some understanding as fitting insulation and draught excluders is relatively low-tech; these techniques have been around for many years and are readily available either at low-cost or, for some people, free. Even if every available insulation technique were applied to a house it would still need to be heated in winter; insulation doesn't generate heat it only helps you hang on to it for a little while longer once you have got it. In my own experience these measures make very little difference to a household heating bill, they simply enable the house to remain warmer for longer.

So why has our dear leader Brown changed his mind? This is speculation and is based only on his past behaviour not on any inside knowledge; the talked about handouts would have been funded by a windfall tax but that is not going to happen – no tax revenue, no payouts. And why is there no windfall tax? Because Gordon Brown cannot face up to anyone with power and influence. This has happened before; big business has got shirty over something the government has threatened to do, made a few loud noises and the government has backed down. Name one instance of Gordon Brown standing up to big business. . . . . I'm listening. You can't remember one? Neither can I. Brown is a political coward. He has no balls [other than Ed], no guts, no fire. He may be a 'nice man' but the working families and pensioners need someone who is prepared to fight for them and protect them from corporate greed.

Tony Woodley, of Unite, is quoted by the Daily Telegraph as saying -

“If greedy fuel companies have won out over struggling consumers then this is not just a disappointing move by the Government but a downright disgrace.

“Yes, we need measures to improve fuel efficiency but these should not be paid for by needy people. At this moment in time people need immediate respite from the struggle to pay their gas and electricity bills.

“There must be a rethink and cash assistance for every needy household in the land. It cannot be right that big business is allowed to bank their obscene profits while ordinary people will shiver this winter.”

Which just about sums up the situation.

He wasn't challenged when Tony Blair stepped down, and he's not being challenged now.

Here are a few of the articles on the subject.

• Iain Martin in today's Daily Telegraph, where his final paragraph says,

"The rebels are trapped by indecision, just as their party is rendered inert by the terrible thought that it is probably stuffed with or without Brown. There is a reason it looks as though nobody involved knows what to do next: they don't."

• Nick Robinson, BBC's Political Editor, alludes to the inaction in his blog, saying,

CLARKE : But we are going to be destroyed if you don't do anything!

MINISTER : Look Charles, I've got to get on with my red box now. Keep in touch...

• Peter Riddell in The Times thinks there's no credible plot to get rid of GB, he says,

"There is no sign of any leading figure willing to confront or challenge Mr Brown."

"But the current caution of the plotters also gives Mr Brown an opportunity to counter-attack, notably via the reshuffle expected in the next few weeks."

Surely, if you fear for the future, as many Labour MP's seem to do, then the party conference is the ideal platform to strike. It might cost you a cabinet job, but you'll show courage and that might, just might, win the crown in an election for leader of the Labour Party.

Looks like David Milliband has bottled his chance twice now. I think I'll follow up with a list of 'runners and riders' to replace Gordon.

This author wishes to extend his greetings to his Muslim readers in South Shields and other parts, hoping that the pursuit of abstinence will bring peace, patience, humility, inner strength and a profound understanding of the privations of those less fortunate. It is important that we understand and empathise with the diverse and various faith beliefs within our communities and respect the commitment to religious purpose given by the adherents of all faiths.

Curly is intrigued like Cranmer as to why Prime Minister Gordon Brown is reported to have offered his greetings at the time of Ramadam to the Muslims of Kuwait, whilst for all intents and purposes failing to offer the same message to the Muslims of Great Britain who form part of the constituency which maintains him in Downing Street. It seems rather odd to send this message to the citizens of another country who are not even members of the British Commonwealth, don't you think?

Gordon Brown appears to have no record of sending greetings to the beleaguered and persecuted Christians in Iran, Iraq, or China, nor does the British taxpayer expend a lot of effort or money on sending out greetings at the start of Lent to Christians in this country either. I suspect that Cranmer might have hit the nail on the head when exclaiming from his burning pile:

So why now mark the beginning of Ramadan as well? And why on earth in Kuwait? And why are British taxpayers forking out for this? Surely Gordon Brown’s greeting for this most holy month is not sullied by any possible link with oil, is it?

:: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: ::

So said Gordon Brown in last night's speech to the CBI in Glasgow.

A clear indictation that the Scottish Government will be given more fiscal autonomy.

Labour are beginning to move to the Nationalist agenda. It looks like another hurdle has been cleared to the destination of independence.

Having conceded the principle, all the SNP and Labour Governments need to do is sit down and argue over detail.

Detail like the SNP would like complete fiscal autonomy for Scotland; and Labour would like taxes and revenues (especially oil revenue) etc to still flow southwards into the Westminster treasury.

Indeed, the logic of Gordon Brown's statement leads to complete fiscal autonomy. Only that will provide a definite link to the success of the Scottish economy.

If it is only a partial fiscal improvement then the Scottish Government of whatever party can always blame the Westminster Government. Admittedly we would see less of this if the same party was in power at both Governments, but the scope will always be there.

Without the complete fiscal autonomy that the SNP want then any failures of the Scottish Government might be landed at Westminster's door.

Gordon Brown has now removed his fingers from the leaky Unionist dyke.

The worst thing he could do now is to put them in his ears.