I have some comments, I’d welcome feedback:

1) The YES campaign state that an MP has to work harder for my vote, yet only those whose 2nd choices are amongst the mainstream parties will have their vote counted.  For example:

If I voted Labour, with my second choice as Green, I can almost certainly guarantee that the Greens will be eliminated in a round before the Conservatives or Lib Dems, so my 2nd choice will be irrelevant. 2) Also, imagine if for example, in a random constituency, the Conservatives won the 1st round with say 25% of the vote, Labour came 2nd with 23%, and the rest of the field had 52%.

If of those 52%, a quarter of the vote were redistributed to each of those two parties after successive rounds, and half the voters didn’t include a preference for either of those parties, then the result would stand at:

38% – Conservative
36% – Labour

Now as far as I can see from all the advertising, I am being told that that an MP MUST have 50% of the vote to win, yet in the scenario I have just gone through, the winning candidate has just won by only 2% of the vote and not only that, but 62% of the electorate have confirmed that of all the candidates, they definitely don’t want that one to win (Where-as under the current system we would just assume as-much! ).

2) Although over the past 20 years, there have been many occasions when Labour supporters may have voted Lib Dem to keep out the Conservatives, and vice versa, that certainly won’t be the case in the near future, so the chances are that there will be a lot of people only putting one choice on their ballot paper, so we’ll be in no better position than we were to start with.

3) The only benefit I can see to the AV system is for fringe parties. Those parties that may get the electorate to put them as a number one choice (perhaps as a protest vote, as has benefited the BNP, and Green party in the past).

Those people that think, “I will vote for the UKIP as my 1st preference to protest to the Government that I am not happy with our stance on the EU, but it’s okay, because they won’t win and the Conservatives will get my vote as usual”. Yet this backfires, because the 10,000 other voters put UKIP as their 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th choices, and the Conservatives are knocked out in the 5th round. UKIP then win because the importance of someone’s single vote has been diluted to the point that they start playing ‘chicken’ with politicians, and they thought they would use their ‘back-up’ vote to protest to the current Government.

Of course all of this is hypothetical, and each scenario relies on specific circumstances, but I’ve just spent the evening talking to my brother, coming up with plenty more scenarios that follow the same lines. I just think that this system isn’t quite what we’re looking for, and the common argument that ‘it’s a step in the right direction’, may work for the likes of equality laws, and healthcare reforms, but that argument shouldn’t be employed for the foundation of our democracy. If we’re gonna change it, it should done right.

I had fallen into the same trap I fell into all those years ago whilst living in Notting Hill.   That trap is complacency, melancholy, and downright laziness.

The first time in London I slipped into this state after the first two years.  This time it happened to me after the first two months. Well no more dammit!

I am now resolved to get out more.  To visit things, to be a tourist, to experience things, to eat in places I have never eaten in before, to drink in places I have never drunk in before, and to live in ways I have never lived before.

The first experience was the new Titanic Exhibition at the O2 Bubble.   It has over 300 genuine pieces of memorabilia rescued from the ocean floor, and tells the story of the Titanic from it’s design through to it’s demise. Over-all a fantastic exhibit and having the opportunity to actually touch a piece of her hull, to connect myself with such an important piece of history was a profound and resonating moment in my life.

When entering the exhibit you are handed a boarding pass in the name of an original Titanic passenger, complete with basic information of that person’s background.  Towards the end of the exhibition I survived, but for the briefest of moments I was actually worried about my fate.  The exhibition did it’s job.

The only downside I found was the inaccurate recreation of the First Class cabin.   Instead of being a snapshot of the past, the room was the wrong shape, the furniture was ‘a rough example of the furniture of the period’ not even close to the originals, the carpet was a modern cheap alternative, the dining table was in the bedroom, and the bedroom was missing a wardrobe (which a previous section of the exhibition had gone into through detail about).  No attention had been paid to detail.  It was disappointing.

Other than this, I thoroughly enjoyed the afternoon, and felt as if I had achieved something.  I went on to have dinner in cute little Mediterranean bistro that I had never eaten in before, and watch the X-Factor from a bar in Soho instead of from the couch at home.

Yes. This is good.  I’ll be getting out more often.  :)

http://www.viewlondon.co.uk/whatson/titanic-exhibition-london-article-10255.html

Despite what the Conservatives are saying, I don’t believe that ‘the country has shown that they no longer want Gordon Brown’, or ‘if the country finds that Gordon Brown is still running the country then they will be very angry’.  There are plenty of people that voted Lib Dem just to keep the Conservatives out, so these are Lib Dem voters that won’t be upset with a Labour-led coalition government.

Right now, it appears the country is pretty evenly split between left and right wings as far as seats is concerned.  It just so happens that the left wing is split between Labour, the Lib Dems, the SDP, the Greens, and various other parties, and the right wing is made up of just one, the Conservatives.  The only reason, being that the Conservatives are out on their own in areas of policy and ethos.

Conservatives have been talking about how Labour cannot run a coalition as ‘the people’ will be against it.  Well let me just remind the Conservatives.  They have only exceeded Labour by 7% of the vote.  If Labour and the Lib Dems form a coalition, then the Government would represent over 52% of the popular vote, to the Conservatives 36%.

So what happens after a Tory/Lib Dem Queen’s speech?  How many Conservative manifesto pledges won’t make it that far because the Lib Dems have forced them out?  Then once in Government, how many policies will make it to law.  Will ANY Lib Dem who has been elected morally be able to vote FOR Trident and a Nuclear deterrent?  Will they vote to abolish the Licence fee?  Will they agree a budget that makes immediate swingeing cuts when they campaigned that it would be economic suicide? Will they vote to force BT to sell off its infrastructure to other private companies (ie Rupert Murdoch), will they vote to increase the inheritance tax threshold for the rich?   Will they vote to reduce the top band tax rate?

For any Lib Dem that is worthy to represent their party and it’s beliefs, the answer has to be no.  Of course there are some policies with wiggle room, but those listed above are just a few of many which are core fundamental values at the heart of the Lib Dem ethos.   To vote against these core value would put the Lib Dems back decades, and lose them any respect they have managed to build.  They will be known as the party who are willing to betray their beliefs for short term gain, and without looking at the bigger picture.

The Economy

The Global recession is widely reported to be the worst on record.  I have been alive long enough to remember the last two, and whilst this one may be bigger on paper, the effect has been dramatically less.

There are two answers to the deficit being put forward by the main political parties:

Conservatives = Make cuts NOW , Labour and Lib Dem = Sure up Economic growth, then make cuts over 4 years.

I don’t know about you, but on any given day I would much prefer to have a job whilst my government is in debt, than to be unemployed whilst my government enjoys a healthy balance sheet.

I realise that this is a selfish and simplistic view, and yes, I realise that there are risks for a Government to be in debt; however, the economy IS growing again, and Labour’s plan is detailed whilst remaining flexible, and makes perfect sense to me.  The Conservative plan sounds exactly the same as their previous 2 mishandled recessions.  They simply don’t seem to understand that the moment Government budgets are cut, private sector contracts and therefore JOBS, are going to be lost, meaning more money paid out in benefits, and less income tax and VAT revenues coming in.  I’ve seen it before twice, and I don’t want to see it again.  I’m employed and I want to stay that way to ride out the difficult times.

The business leaders that are hailing Cameron’s plan are the same ones that will be better off after Cameron implements Conservative tax plans.  I’m not buying it.  Have you also noticed how Cameron’s media policies (like forcing BT to sell off it’s cabling and network, and scrapping the licence fee) play straight into the hands of his best buddy Rupert ‘come have dinner on my yacht’ Murdoch??

(NOTE:  Please read the comment added to this blog by mostly_harmless.  Very good points were made that I haven't written about, yet are still very much relevant)

What did the Conservatives do during their last period in Government?

I’ve been thinking about the introduction of far-reaching, ground-breaking, positively newsworthy ‘social’ policies that truly benefited society during the Conservative Governments of 1979-1997.   I couldn’t think of any, so I asked 6 different middle-aged staunch Conservative voters I used to work with.  The only things THEY could reel off the top of their heads was ‘they gave people the right to buy their own council houses’, and ‘they made Britain strong by standing up to Argentina’.

When I trawled the internet, I pretty-much found the same thing.  It pails in comparison to Labour’s list below.

I did however, find this:

“Well they ordered the riot police to beat the crap out of striking miners, then caused riots with a poll tax, denied there was any evidence that you could catch CJD from infected beef (Not everyone has forgotten), privatised anything they could get hold of, took free milk away from children, and squandered a large amount of North sea gas and oil. Although without them, Spitting image wouldn’t have been that funny, so its not like they are all bad.”

I only wish I could take credit for that.  Thank you wildkarrde

The List:

So here is my list of reasons why I will be voting Labour:

1. Gave Independence to the Bank of England.
   Freeing politicians from the temptation to alter interest rates in big election give-aways.
2. Stopping Genocide in Sierra Leone
   Over two decades of government neglect of the interior followed by the spilling over of the Liberian conflict into its borders eventually led to the Sierra Leone Civil War, which began in 1991 and was resolved in 2000 after the struggling Nigerian led United Nations troops were heavily reinforced by a British force spearheaded by 42 Commando of the Royal Marines as well as several British Army units. The arrival of this force in what was codenamed OPERATION PALLISER resulted in the defeat of rebel forces and restored the civilian government elected in 1998 to Freetown. Since then, almost 72,500 former combatants have been disarmed and the country has reestablished a functioning democracy.
3. Repealed ‘Section 28′.
   Allowing Homosexually to be discussed in schools.  Being a teenager and gay is harrowing enough, without it being considered a ‘taboo’.  At least if it can be openly talked about, it it shows that it truly is nothing to be ashamed of.
4. Allowed equal rights for surviving gay partners by allowing Civil Partnerships.
   Through the introduction of civil partnerships, Labour has for the first time given legal recognition to same-sex partners. Gay couples now have the same inheritance, pension and next-of-kin rights as married couples.
5. Reduced the legal age of consent for homosexual sexual relations to 16 to fall in line with heterosexual relations.
6. Introduced the National minimum wage.
7. Introduced Paternity leave for new fathers.
8. Maternity pay from day one, maternity pay extended from 14 to 26 weeks.
9. Negotiated the Good Friday Agreement bringing peace to Northern Ireland.
10. Backed a winning bid for the 2012 Olympics, initiating incredible redevelopment of London’s East End.
11. Saw through the construction of the Millennium Dome, despite the opposition of an extremely narrow minded press and a bandwagon-hopping Conservative party.
    The reported £900 million this cost, paid for the new transport infrastructure (improvements to the bus network and Jubilee Line), the clearance of dozens of acres of toxic land that had been unusable for years, created a world class entertainment venue which continues to pay rent into the government coffers, has produced acres of prime real estate for the private sector to develop which would have been left as abandoned warehouses, and became a direct example to the IOC as to what government/private partnerships could accomplish in the East End, which ultimately resulted in a successful Olympic bid.
12. Overall crime is down 36 per cent; domestic burglary is down 54 per cent; vehicle related crime is down 57 per cent; and violent crime is down 41 per cent.
    The fear of crime however, has increased exponentially. Especially for the Daily Mail and it’s readers (ie; the Conservative party).
13. Pensioners, the disabled, and their carers, have been given free bus travel throughout the UK.
14. Winter fuel allowances for the Elderly.
    Pensioners no longer need to risk death because they cannot afford to buy the grandchildren Christmas presents AND heat their home.  I know that the Conservatives and the Lib Dems suggest that they would rather scrap this and increase Pensions instead.  I have only one comment….the winter fuel payments are TAX FREE.  Pensions are not.
15. Free swimming, free eye tests, free TV licences for over-75s.
16. VAT on fuel reduced to 5%
17. A minimum income guarantee for Pensioners.
18. Free TV licences for over-75s.
19. A free nursery place for every 3 and 4 year old.
20. Higher level of Disability Living Allowance of the Blind and Partially Sighted.
21. Over 14,000 more full time police officers have been hired.
22. Created the Independent Police Complaints Commission.
23. Funding in Victim support has more than doubled.
24. Drug treatment for drug users has quadrupled. 96% of drug users receive treatment within three weeks of being assessed.
25. Spending in Education had doubled.
    Actually it has more than doubled.  What HAS doubled is the allowance per pupil.  Regardless of the cries of ‘red tape’ from the other benches, the simple fact is that headteachers has twice as much to spend on their pupils.
26. Hired a further 36,000 extra teachers and 172,000 more classroom assistants.
27. An additional 1,100 new schools have been built or old schools rebuilt.
28. Teachers pay increased by over 40%.
29. Student grants have been re-introduced.
30. Investment in the NHS has risen nearly 200%.
31. Have built 149 new hospitals.
32. Deaths from heart disease are now 40% lower than in 1997.
33. All suspected cancer cases seen within the first two weeks of referral.
    The NHS can now guarantee that you will see a cancer specialist within two weeks if your GP suspects you may have cancer. Whatever your condition, you will not have to wait more than 18 weeks from GP referral to the start of hospital treatment – and most waits are much shorter than this.
34. Guaranteed NHS dentist.
    Did anyone else try to get an NHS dentist in the 80′s and 90′s?  It was a right pain-in-the-tooth wasn’t it?
    
35. Introduced the first ‘points’ system based on successful international models to restrict the number and type of immigration to the UK.
    Previously there had been no limits, and no categorisation of immigrants beyond ‘immigrant’ and ‘asylum seeker’.  Tony Blair also attempted to get camps set up for asylum seekers, to give them somewhere safe to stay, with access to healthcare, shops, and an education for their children, yet keeping them somewhere they couldn’t run away from until their application was processed.  This wonderful idea was shut down by the European Court of Human Rights.  Shame, I thought it was a fantastic idea that only bogus asylum seekers would have been uncomfortable with.
36. Introduced INDEPENDENT National regulation for the Financial Services industry.
    Although this body has power over National Financial ‘business’, it’s powers are limited on a Global level.  Attempts by Gordon Brown to convince the International community to sign up to a Global regulator in 1998 were unsuccessful.  Among others, the French, the USA, and the Chinese were not interested.
37. Leading the world in the abolition of 3rd world debt and climate change.
    Some of the 3rd world’s poorest countries had up to 100% of their debt abolished in a move orchestrated by the UK Government.
38. Introduced ‘Gift Aid’.
    The Gift Aid scheme is for gifts of money by individuals who pay UK tax. Gift Aid donations are regarded as having basic rate tax deducted by the donor. Charities take your donation – which is money you’ve already paid tax on – and reclaim the basic rate tax from HMRC.  For donations between 6 April 2008 and 5 April 2011 the charity will also get a separate government supplement of three pence on every pound you give.
39. Made building access for the disabled and wheelchair users compulsory.
    Suddenly, disabled people had a right to demand that their local shops and businesses catered for their needs, and any companies that were required to retro-fit existing buildings could ask for government financial help.  This made a massive difference to those affected.  This legislation also paved the way for a truly universal public transport system.
40. Banned Smoking in Publicly accessible buildings/restaurants/workplaces.
    Self explanatory, but the health benefits will be realised after a generation.  The Health Service will be cheaper.  Less people are taking up smoking as a result.  Now we just need to ban smoking in doorways…..
41. Banned Fox Hunting.
    I know that a small proportion of the country bleated on about civil liberties, and the death of the countryside economy. But I think they have survived quite well, things change, people move on.   Where were these people when all the mines were closed all at the same time affecting whole towns and hundreds of thousands of people?  They weren’t protesting ‘the death of an industry’ then were they?  No.  They were praising Thatcher for standing up to the Unions, and for not being held to ransom.  Well, guess what; you can get your tractors back into the countryside where they belong.  There’s an old British expression:  What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
42. Over three quarters of GP practices now offer extended opening hours for at least one evening or weekend session a week.
43. All prescriptions are now free for people being treated for cancer or the effects of cancer, and teenage girls are offered a vaccination against cervical cancer.
44. Three million more operations carried out each year than in 1997, with more than double the number of heart operations.
45. Doubled the number of registered childcare places to more than 1.3 million, one for every four children under eight years old.
46. More than doubled the number of apprenticeships starts, with figures for 2008/9 showing 240,000 started an apprenticeship this year compared to 75,000 in 1997.
47. The car scrappage scheme, where owners scrapping an old car receive £2,000 off the price of a new car, has assisted with over 380,000 orders being placed, keeping the automotive industry and its supply chain on its feet.
48. The UK’s greenhouse gas emissions are now 21 per cent below 1990 levels, beating the Kyoto target.
49. Over £20 billion invested in bringing social housing to decent standards.
50. Rough sleeping has dropped by two thirds and homelessness is at its lowest level since the early 1980s.
51. A new flexible Australian-style points-based system for immigration to ensure only those economic migrants who have the skills our economy needs can come to work in the UK.
    Okay, this may not be working at 100% efficiency because it has just been implemented. However it is proven system worldwide and should be more than sufficient to meet the demands of Britain.
52. Neighbourhood police teams.
    Every community now has its own dedicated neighbourhood police team, easily contactable by the people who live in that community and working with them to agree local priorities and deal with people’s concerns.
53. Britain now has more offshore wind capacity than any country in the world. Wind last year provided enough electricity to power 2 million homes.
54. Tripled Britain’s overseas aid budget.
55. Launched the Swimming Challenge Fund to support free swimming for over 60s and under 16s.
56. Free admission to national museums and galleries.
57. Devolution in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, an elected Mayor and Assembly for London and directly-elected mayors for those cities that want them.
58. Created a new right of pedestrian access to the English coast, so that every family has the opportunity to enjoy the length and breadth of our coastline.
59. Introduced four weeks’ paid holiday guarantee.
60. Introduced the right to request flexible working.
61. Introduced the same legal protection for part-time workers as full-time workers.
62. CAN YOU ADD TO MY LIST?  Please comment!

Add to this, that VAT has remained the same, my income tax went down.

That record ain’t too shabby now is it?

I wish Labour political broadcasts and interviews shouted lists like this from the rooftops.  I don’t think they ‘spin’ enough any more…..

The reason is, that there are so many pundits, commentators, and know-it-alls already wading in deep, that one more voice would be pointless.  There are plenty of people out there already saying what I think.  One of them is the leader of one of the parties.  They will be getting my vote, and although 6 months ago I was a little on the fence, I am now so far over the fence that I’m in the neighbours pool.

Roll on the election, then the Government can get back to business.

David Cameron and his travelling circus almost seemed a viable alternative.   Right up until the moment they started revealing their policies.

The latest of which is a promise to cut, cut, cut within days of coming to power.  What they fail to realise is that every cut that gets made will have a knock-on effect to services being purchased from the private sector.  Unemployment will rise, interest rates will fall, and we’ll be back into decline along with our Italian, German, and Spanish friends.

Where-as Labours policy seems rather more sensible to me.  Let the Government take the strain, wait until the country has it’s own momentum in the direction of growth (lets say a year – well, actually the boffins said ‘a year’ as that’s when they’ve forecast the economy will be strong enough), THEN cut the deficit over a very reasonable 4 years to a tune of 50%.

We seem to have a party that will say what it thinks people want to hear, wihtout actually using relevant data to inform themselves.  I want my economic policy decided by a trained economist, who is being fed with all the latest data and opinions from across the globe, to then create a steady, conservative approach to deficit reduction, growth, and job creation.  What I don’t want is a party lurching around, changing it’s policies based on Daily Mail headlines regarding the state of our finances.

Economies go into recession when people stop spending, so the very last thing we need is the Government to lead the charge.  Four years is ample time to clear the deficit in my book.

The only thing that worries me about a Labour win is the effort their ministers and think-tanks put into social engineering policies.  Things like raising the minimum price of alcohol; what a crock!  Government should concentrate on the big things.  Over the past 13 years Labour have succeeded in a lot of ‘big’ areas;  things like Independence to the Bank Of England, Stopping genocide in Kosovo, The Northern Ireland Peace Treaty, repealing Section 28, creating Civil Partnerships and equal rights for same-sex couples, leading the charge to whip off African Debt, the smoking ban creating the amazing entertainment space which is the O2 Arena and surrounding area (which is already making more money than it cost), the successful Olympic bid which is creating Billion of Pounds worth of regeneration to hundreds of acres of land across the country, and we have led the world on climate change, 3rd world debt, resolving the financial ‘crisis’ amongst other things.  But all of these things have been mired by other things like ASBO’s, and those crazy children’s savings account things!

I may update this later,  but it’s Valentine’s day and I have preparations to make for my Valentine!

I haven’t exactly worked out why he’s suddenly developed from being a pompous arse who ignored me for two months whilst I was working away.  He tried to blame me for being out of touch for 8 weeks when I was working away, poor, with no access to email whilst I was working for a defence contractor), and no mobile phone as I couldn’t afford the bill.  But if he took that personally, then he is certainly not as emotionally mature as a 40-something man should be.

I think the other housemate (the one I blogged about a short while ago) may have had a hand in telling tall tales.  It makes me laugh somewhat as Mark has developed Chris’s talent of ignoring any points of a letter/email/msg that they have no answer for.  He has avoided the reason he ignored me for 2 months since before Christmas, he avoided the fact that financially he is not worse off, he’s ignored the fact that everything I told him came true, and he’s buried his head in the sand as soon as I ask for a simple reason for why he’s behaving like a 10 year old.  He thinks he’s such a big man.  In truth he’s a 40-something loser in a dead-end job, who tries to act way above his intellectual level.   Maybe he should concentrate on being a father to his kids and find himself someone he can settle down with.

The full facebook convo, is below.  I have nothing to hide and I’m sick of people walking all over me, and I’m not going to stand for his threats.  I’ve also put auto-delete, and auto-forwards on my email addresses, so that any further emails from either Chris, Mark or John get forwarded onto all three and deleted from my inbox.  I don’t need to be aware of the fantasy minds of complete loonatics.  Maybe the boiler is leaking in the flat causing mass hysteria! lol

I walk away from him knowing that I have acted with the best of intentions, and my lifestyle was severely curtailed during the latter part of 2009 whilst I made sure that they still had a roof over their heads, and because I couldn’t hold their hands through the whole process, they rebelled against me; oh…..and the dishwasher door still hasn’t been fixed after 6 months.

Chris and Mark are very well suited to eachother

Final Facebook Conversation: RICH / MARK

Apparently not.  It seems that the BBC, ITV, Sky, The Guardian, The Mail, The Sun, The Mirror, The Star, The Times, all of the protesters, columnists, bloggers, and stay-at-home Blair-haters have all received the MI5/MI6/CIA/FBI/FSB files, all of the Cabinet Minister’s reports, the Civil Service files, the Military dossiers, not to mention the satellite imagery and witness statements from on the ground in Iraq.

I wish I had signed up to receive these too.  I’m guessing that Mr John Chilcott is also feeling a little foolish, as he appears to have missed out on that mailshot also.  He, just like me, is having to wait until people give evidence to find out what happened.  He like me is having to read through published documents to establish the timeline and decision making process that led to the invasion of Iraq.  What fools we are.

But I suspect that I may be wrong.  That there has been no release of information.  My suspicion is that 95% of the media are using nothing more than the court of uninformed public opinion obtained from what I only hope is a very small percentage of ignorant dullards, on which to base their reports of the facts; rather than using the freely available facts themselves.

The Times report of Tony Blair’s appearance in front the Inquiry today was headlined ‘Unrepentant Blair says ‘I’d do it again‘ , followed by the tagline ‘Tony Blair branded a murderer and liar after ending his appearance before Iraq inquiry with a refusal to voice any regrets‘.   What they failed to do was report any of the factual answers to questions.  They did however report about how he ‘felt’ about it all.  It turns out that one person in the audience of the Inquiry was responsible for the ‘murderer and liar’ comment.  Yet reading the headline, my first assumption was that the Inquiry had made that determination.

What they failed to do, and what all media outlets have failed to do is ask us: ‘If you were in Tony Blair’s position, with same facts at your fingertips that Mr Blair had in 2003; would you have made the same decisions?’, and ‘if nothing had been done, and Saddam had refused for the umpteenth time to abide by UN resolutions and inspections, would the world, and would the region be a safer place now’.   The unfortunate reality is that 95% of the population absolutely would have done the same thing, if in the exact same position, and the even more unfortunate reality is that 94% of the population are too ignorant and uninformed to admit it.

The security situation of the entire world dramatically declined on September 11th 2001.  It has got no worse since 2003.  In fact less people have died per year in terrorist attacks around the world since 2004 than in the years 2001-2003.  I for one am happy to see that Iraq is holding it’s own trials and tribunals against those who committed mass atrocities against it’s own citizens and it’s neighbours in the country’s recent history.   These trials are being held in open court, with findings and evidence being published frequently.  This would never have happened under Saddam, and these people would have never seen justice.  They would have continued their life living in palaces, living off the income from the oil fields whilst the workers suffered, and those that were of a different religious order would be raped, tortured and murdered at the whim of a power-hungry fascist elite.

When the ‘war’ first started a majority of the commentators to this post-war world were not standing on the rooftop crying ‘shame! foul!’.  Most of them were with public opinion, which was a sense of ‘something needs to be done, but we’re not entirely convinced that war is the way to go, however Saddam is making a mockery of the UN, and if this works as it should the actual ‘war’ should be over very soon’.  The silent majority were happy to support our troops and see where it went, as were the commentators.   But since the war, the slow and bloody rebuilding effort has caused a sway of ‘I-told-you-so’s’ from the people who in reality told us nothing of the sort.  They created a very hefty bandwagon on which there appeared to be enough room for everyone to jump.

Opinions are useless in all walks of life unless they are informed ones.  Informed by either a collection of accurate facts, or in the absence of facts, a healthy dose of experience in the field, and history of the situation at hand.  The British public and the media have neither.  They were not subject to the briefings, the reports, the intelligence gathering, and back-room talks; let alone the ‘tipped-winks, unnaturally prolonged hand-shakes coupled with a brief stare, and quiet maneuvering’ that has been a part of international diplomacy for thousands of years.  They were not, never will be, and most definitely shouldn’t be aware of all of the information gathered and where that information came from.

So the people that stand outside the QE2 Conference centre holding up the ‘Bliar’ banners, need to sit back for a moment.  They need to think about what information they have that the Chilcot Inquiry don’t. They should come forward and say what meetings they are aware of that contradict Tony Blair’s testimony.  They need to explain to the people that have yet to make up their mind, why they think that Tony Blair is a murderer, why they feel the coalition that went to Iraq had no business being there.   Why only a minority of Iraqi citizens feel the need to move around blowing things up yet the rest seem happy to create life, jobs and government, whilst the protesters share the same sentiment to the ‘war’ as the minority.  They need to explain why they say the only reason we went to war was money and oil,  yet the amount of oil being imported to the UK and the US in 2003-2008 is on average 44% lower than it was in the years up to 2003.  The oil price is not set by the UK or the US, and the income for the oil being extracted in Iraq is shared between the companies extracting it, and the Iraqi government.   The military operation has cost billions, and will continue to cost billions more.   There has been no financial incentive.   The US military is currently using thousands of troops, and many more engineers to upgrade the oil infrastructure in Iraq, and to ensure the security of it’s workers.  They are not getting paid for this task, and the only benefits are to the Iraqi Government, the people of Iraq, and the companies that work there.

Those people I referred to earlier who appeared to already be in possession of information that eludes the rest of us; the protesters, the media etc., they have already made up their minds.  They are baying for blood. Shouting words like ‘Justice! Murderer!’  Some feel that capital punishment should return for Blair and the like. They shout about an open trial by jury, and the ‘inevitable whitewash’ if the Inquiry was to rule ‘no foul’.  Yet how fair could the trial be, if to all of these people, ANY verdict other than ‘Blair is guilty, and the War was unfounded’ is deemed incorrect.  In reality there is already a trial occurring.  There is a panel of several learned men and women, weighing evidence and ‘judging’ the participants.   The only reason that this isn’t good enough for some, is that the panel was undecided on the outcome at the start, is looking to learn things that were unknown to them before, and wish to be fair and open-minded.  The only trial that would suit the placard holders would have to be made up of people who had their opinions of guilt/innocence registered before the commencement of the Inquiry.

The protesters need to get on with their lives, and start helping others.  If they have the time to stand outside buildings shouting outright lies on a weekday, then they have time to go out into the world, learning how it really works, and helping those that truly need help.  They are spiteful, mean-spirited, and two-faced.

As for the media.  A return to factual reporting, allowing the people to make informed decisions, and leaving the bias, the manipulation, and bare-faced hypocrisy behind would benefit society far more than the current model, yet perhaps wouldn’t be so profitable.

I welcome any comments to this blog, and I look forward to debating with those who may hold a different view.

All ties have been severed with my paranoid, delusional, lying, manipulative, self-obsessed, selfish, compassion-less, pathetic excuse of a human being house mate.  How I ever loved him is beyond me.  He is and always has been obsessed with blaming me for all the issues in his life, and trying to turn every situation into a reason to throw his bile-ridden hate-filled rants at me.  Every time I have been accused of something by that man I have proved my innocence, but he still mis-remembers every situation and holds each one of them as an example of why I am bad; all the time ignoring the fact that each scenario has had me go out of my way to correct situations I had no hand in creating.  If it wasn’t for the fact that I loved and cared for him I would have cut and run a year ago.

Throughout the course of our friendship I was accused of so much.  One of those things was having a secret relationship with his worst enemy.  Yes I did this, and yes for 8 months I lied about it.  For one very simple reason:  I genuinely believed that for him to find out would cause more pain than if he was unaware.  Once I decided to keep it a secret there were several other lies, related to my whereabouts at certain times mostly, that I committed over the course of the 8 months until he found out.   I freely admit that my decision was in error, I never should have lied, but at the time I thought it was the best decision to protect the feelings of someone I loved and cared for.  No amount of apology recovered me from this decision in his eyes, and a lunatic mind then conjured up scenarios bringing all the previous accusations to bear on me, despite the fact that every last one of them was a false accusation and had been proved to be so.  In his mind I had hurt him deliberately, and there must have been other reasons for me hiding my relationship, and all of these reasons were related to hurting him, and abusing him and his trust.  He just couldn’t see that it was the simplest of reasons, and the reason that pointed to exactly how much I loved him.

Why is this in this blog? Not my usual content I suppose. But writing it down, knowing it is here in black and white somehow gives it meaning, gives it closure.   This guy has been the cause of so much hurt, so much pain, but the opposite is also true.  Whatever the future holds for my life, these past 2 years have been a major milestone in that journey.  A portion of my life that for better, and for worse has shaped me.  It has reinforced my distrust in people, yet re-affirmed my faith in humanity. I will remember it; I will remember him for the rest of my life.

I’m not expecting him to read this blog, and furthermore I don’t think it will reach anyone who knows him.  But just in case it does, I would like to apologise for giving my feelings a form, for putting in writing what some might hold to be a private matter.  I just needed to do it, to end a small but eventful chapter of my life.

I loved him.  I truly did, and with all my heart, and I know for sure that he loved me.  For my actions to be able to hurt him so much, he had to have had a deep connection to me.  It could have worked.   A different time in our lives, different circumstances; it could have worked.  But only fools cry over what could have been.

I will miss calling him my friend.