Blog Moved

Hello. I have moved my blog to the following URL:

http://www.dominictristram.com/

Please come and read my posts there!

Recycling and Charging

The government has announced that it has ruled out plans to look into charging for the amount of non-recyled domestic waste and is instead looking to 'reward' people based on the weight of the waste they leave on the kerbside for recycling. In this article I consider this approach, both in effectiveness, cost, and motive.

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GM crops

There have been some worrying noises coming from the government about GM crops recently, and the pro-GM case is being made more loudly every day. One might think that we don't have to worry about this since public opinion is so strongly against GM, but such opinion is easily swayed by only hearing one side of the argument, or worse, invalid argument. This has been demonstrated recently by the shift of opinion towards nuclear power that has taken place in a relatively short timescale, thanks mainly to piggy-backing a genuine concern (CO2 emissions). The government presented a false dichotomy - it's either nuclear power or more fossil fuels - rather than anything valid. Will the same thing happen with GM?

The news has recently been full of reports of food riots in developing countries due to the increasing costs of grain. The 'obvious' solution to this, as trotted-out by sections of the press, ministers, and those with vested interests, is the use of GM crops. However, what would these crops actually achieve, and are they in fact our only choice?

The main selling-point of GM crops is their resilience to herbicides. Companies such as Monsanto don't try to hide this fact, and yet it's a commonly held belief that using GM crops would allow us to use less chemicals on the fields. This is a myth. Many GM crops make the plants more tolerant of them, allowing the farmers to use far more. This does its job and kills the weeds, but also causes far more pollution. Funnily enough some crops, such as Monsanto's ''Roundup Ready' varieties, are specifically engineered to be resistant to their 'Roundup' herbicides. It's not unusual for GM crop producers to modify plants to further their other products.

Monsanto is a particularly shady company, of course. They have a history of suing farmers who happen to have had their crops wind-pollinated by GM crops in neighbouring farmers fields. It's actually amazing that Monsanto win in such cases - what are farmers meant to do? Pollen can travel for several miles and can remain active for up to ten years, and if it happens to fall onto non-GM fields it can pollenate plants there, making it very difficult to prevent contamination. If your crop is contaminated with GM pollen like this then you lose the ability to say GM-free, through no fault of your own. However, it gets worse - if you decide to keep some grain to replant next year, and unknown to you it has been contaminated, you can be sued by Monsanto, as this farmer in Canada can testify. Of course, some countries wouldn't want to allow this sort of thing, but it's useful for Monsanto when the US mandates GM crops as part of an aid package. GM crops or starvation? It's not a tough choice, but once GM is there it's there for good.

The pro-GM groups usually trot-out the line that GM crops will save poor countries. Let's assume that an African farmer decides to make use of GM - what should he grow? He'd probably want to grow crops suited to the climate, such as yams. However, he's unlikely to find that the GM companies are willing to help him here. The biotech companies are like the drugs companies in that they invest in the areas most likely to make them money, hence lots of research into cancer (which hits the rich, western world) and little into malaria (which doesn't). So we end-up with plenty of GM wheat that will make lots of money from western farmers, but little that will grow in Africa and actually help the poor.

The power of GM food producers and the rest of the biotech food industry is immense. For instance, a bill currently being considered in the US prohibits organic milk producers from being able to label their product as free from Bovine Growth Hormone, but it fails to force any milk produced from hormone-treated cows from being labelled as such. This bill is being pushed-through by Monsanto and other GM lobbyists and is almost certain to succeed, and it shows immense contempt for the consumer. Whether consumers want GM food or not, they should be given the choice.

In the end, it is wrong that a corporation can 'own' any species, whether they created it or not. Now that the possibility of doing so is legal, where will it end. As scientists develop more complex 'artificial' animals, as will happen with the human-hybrid work recently in the news, what is the point at which a life should no longer be owned? How can a corporation decide what forms of life can breed, and which must die without doing so? Isn't a fundamental purpose of any living thing to reproduce?

If you have time, be sure to watch The World According To Monsanto", which was shown on French TV. It's excellent and contains many important facts to help you make up your own mind on the issue.

Inheritance Tax

Inheritance tax seems to be making the news at the moment, with both the Tories and Labour trying to outdo each other in reducing it. This only goes to show just how similar the two big parties have become. Inheritance tax should, if anything, be increased.

One thing that seems bizarre to me is quite why so many people worry about inheritance tax in the first place. In reality it simply isn't an issue for the vast majority of us. Last year 40,000 estates in England and Wales were liable to inheritance tax, while the same year there were 502,599 deaths. As a very rough guide that suggests that considerably fewer than ten percent of people who die have to worry about the tax at all. The reason that people worry about it is because they have an irrational optimism of their own financial future. Let's face it, most of us don't get rich. It's the sort of thinking that makes the public hostile to policies like 50% income tax on earnings over 100,000 - there's no way that's going to be a problem for most people, yet you hear people saying things like 'why tax success?' and other nonsense.

So what about the level at which the tax is payable? Well, until today it was 300,000 pounds. It has now (or will shortly) go up to 600,000 - a level which a tiny percentage of estates will reach. I think that this is a terrible decision, and if anything it should be reduced. The level at which tax starts to be paid all rather depends on what you want the tax to achieve, and inheritance tax is basically performing a redistribution function. It is one of the methods the state uses to make sure that too much money does not stay in the hands of too few people. If anything, this is becoming more of a problem, not less, so why on Earth are we reducing the effectiveness of one of the tools that we can use against it?

It's worth tackling the 'I've paid tax on it once, why should I pay again?' argument too. The reason that people are suddenly concerned about the tax in the first place is because property prices have increased so much. Houses have gone up in value far faster than inflation recently, which means that an initially modest investment is now worth hundreds of thousands. What people seem to forget is that the sum where 'tax has already been paid' is usually a small percentage of today's value, so in fact for most estates only a small percentage of the value has had tax paid on it anyway. It's only right that tax is paid, and paying once you've died seems like the most convenient time to me.

In the end we have to tax people on death precisely because property prices are high. By placing a tax on inherited properties people will be forced to sell them, placing the house back into the market. More houses on the market will help to bring prices down to a reasonable level, benefiting everyone. If the tax is reduced then the government will still need that money so they'll just tax something else, and that's going to be something that we all have to pay when we're alive, and probably something that has to be paid by far more people. Inheritance tax has so many logical advantages to such a majority of the population, so why has reducing it become so popular with voters? In the end we can probably put it down to selfishness and misplaced optimism, yet again. And so the wheel of capitalism turns...

Green Taxes 'Making Billions'. Or not.

It was hard to avoid the item on the news this morning about a group claiming that 'green taxes' are 'making billions'... far more, it is claimed, than the cost of pollution itself. Stating that fines and taxes are 'revenue generation' as if this is a bad thing is an old argument of course, and one that is often used against speed cameras. However, in this case the target is a much more serious one than speed cameras as it's an issue that is of vital importance to the whole world.

First let us look at the claims. Apparently 'green taxes' brought in 21.9 billion last year, while the emissions had done 11.7 billion worth of 'damage'. 'Green taxes' here include things like fuel duty - hardly a green tax.. more like something that the government has always charged. It also includes landfill tax and other taxes that could be considered green of course, but the scope is rather wide. What they actually mean therefore is a collection of taxes that is levied against things that may harm the environment, rather than green taxes in particular.

What I really have a problem with is the 'cost' of emissions they have come up with. Just how have they calculated this, exactly? Is the 'cost' of a landfill the amount it would be to dig it all up? No - it's the cost of burning-off the methane. I don't think that their idea of costs and mine, or any normal person, are quite the same. Also, how do you put a cost on the effect of a ton of CO2 going into the atmosphere and having some part in flooding yet more of Bangladesh? No, the whole 'cost' is a nonsense. 'Green' taxes aren't there to level some sort of account we have with the environment, they're there to stop people polluting in the first place. The only thing that will make some people stop is to hit them in the wallet, since appealing to their morals seems to fail. People must be priced out of their cars and flights, and motivated into recycling by the cost of not doing it. Society isn't profiteering from this, just making people pay something closer to the real cost of their selfish ways.

Finally, just who are The Tax Payers Alliance? Well, take a look. Surprise surprise, they are the usual right-wing nutjobs. Just who let a story by these people make the headlines? The chairman Andrew Allum left the Tories 'having lost faith that it represented his brand of free market, individualist and compassionate politics', that is to say that they probably weren't quite right-wing enough for him. The chief executive, Matthew Elliot, is a young chap who has worked for 'Britain’s leading Eurorealist think-tank', so he's clearly going to look at European issues objectively, right? Finally, Florence Heath works... and this is a good one... for an oil company. Brilliant. She's bound to be fully committed to the environment then.

Honestly though, what the hell is the BBC doing even giving these people the time of day? Three people who make the UKIP look sensible manage to get headlines on the Today programme?! Maybe I'll start my own 'think tank', since I seem to be just as qualified to do so. The trouble is, when you take the 'green' side you probably find that industry is slightly less willing to grease your palm. Perhaps the BBC should just ignore press releases from organisations that can't be bothered to get their own domain for their Web site? It doesn't show a lot of commitment to their cause does it? Either that or they're technically inept, but neither of these possibilities inspire a huge amount of confidence...

Less privacy, more work

An interesting policy from the Tories emerged today. They'd quite like to scrap our data protection laws. These are the laws that put restrictions on what businesses can do with your personal data, such as not selling it to people who send junk mail. Apparently this 'red tape' is annoying for businesses. Another annoying bit of 'red tape' is the Working Time Directive, which they also plan to scrap.

Much as I don't want the Tories to win, some of their moves are beyond belief. How are either of these changes meant to be vote winners? Sure, they make sense if you are a CEO, or perhaps just a bit evil.. but the man on the street? How can be gain from a change which means he can be forced to work even longer hours than he does now? And when he gets home from his longer day, he can expect to find tons more junk mail thanks to the fact that companies he has dealt with have sold his personal information (potentially to people who want to steal his identity). Note that they also want redundancy regulations to be 'relaxed' so that we can all lose our jobs more easily too.

Some would say that these moves are 'liberal' in a 'libertarian' sort of way, but I'm afraid that they are many facets of libertarianism that lead to corporations ruling the world, and we can see some examples right here. We need state control when it comes to not exploiting workers. 'Red tape' is sometimes useful, but for some reason it is one of those phrases that have stuck into the public mindset as a 'bad thing'. In reality, here are the Conservatives showing their true colours. They don't care about anyone except the 'boss class' and making their lives easier. Quite why anyone who is a decent human being would support things like this is beyond me. Having said that, this will of course be overlooked at the next election and we'll all be concentrating on some non-issue. You have to love the British press.

Trains, transport and money

So the government has said that they will give a whole load of money towards improving the rail network. This can only be a good thing, but it does seem to be a case of too little too late in a lot of respects. For all of the governments talk of green and sustainable transport policies, we're seeing a lot of funding for roads and aviation, but not a lot else. Road and air travel are cheaper in real terms now than they have ever been, yet since privatisation rail travel has become quite a lot more expensive. This is despite the fact that more people are travelling by rail all of the time.

The ESRC have some interesting statistics on travel, such as the cost to the UK of road accidents being 16 billion pounds per year. Road travel is not cheap, but the government doesn't worry about paying for roads and road improvement with public money. Why should the railways be any different? It goes without saying that I think they should be renationalised, but what else could be done to improve them?

I think that a big improvement could be achieved by putting a much higher tax on road transport of goods that could be transported by train, for one thing. We need new train lines to new depots in each town and city where goods can be unloaded and only the last part of the journey done by road. It is madness that we drive lorries with containers on them down motorways when rail is so much more efficient.

The railway network needs to be expanded. Where old lines closed in the 60's remain clear, they should be either reopened or protected from any development until such a time as they are economically viable. These lines were viable once, and the population was smaller then. If the costs of road transport start reflecting the true environmental costs, then these rail links will undoubtedly become useful again.

Fares need to become cheaper. Renationalisation is necessary for this, since I think it is fundamentally wrong to pay a public subsidy to a private company that makes a profit for its shareholders. If the railways were nationalised we could put an extra tax on petrol for road transport.. a couple of pence per litre say, and use that as a direct rail subsidy. Taxes on larger cars could also go to public transport, since taxing luxury cars takes the burden from the poor, who may still need to drive.

Finally, we need to think very hard about the way we build our towns and cities. As long as people feel that they need their cars then they will probably keep them, so we should do as much as we can to remove that need. This is already true in most of London and other big cities, where cars are a luxury. All new housing developments should include local shops and pubs etc within half a mile of any house to prevent people from having to travel just to buy food. This isn't some pipe-dream since this always used to be the case! Rail and buses should link residential areas so that people can get to work, and there should be tax incentives to live in the town or city you work in, to reduce the need to travel. We can do this if we try. If we don't tackle it and just bury our heads in the sand, things are only going to get worse... especially when the oil starts to run out.

Convicted Traitor? No jail for you!

My complete despair when it comes to American politics continues to deepen. The widely publicised news of the day is that Bush has 'spared' Libby from 2.5 years in jail. His reason? It seems that he thought it was an 'excessive' punishment, so obviously 'no jail at all' is the correct amount for lying to a grand jury and exposing a CIA agent, potentially threatening their life, because their husband had criticised the invasion of Iraq.

At a fundamental level the leader of any democratic country should not have the power to overrule the courts anyway. What sort of example is this to countries we accuse of corruption? The message is that you can do anything you like as long as you are chums with those in power. Hardly inspiring. However, just because previous presidents have done it isn't an excuse for its continuation! It's fairly telling that the Republican defence of pretty much anything stupid, immoral or just plain illegal that Bush and his cronies do is that 'Clinton lied about having an affair!'. Yes he did, and of course he shouldn't have done it. He was also no saint in many other areas of course, but let's face it, Bush has done more to make the world a worse, more dangerous, divisive, polluted, greedy and generally bad place than almost anyone else in the last decade... apart from Cheney, perhaps.

Closer to home we are right to worry about the BAe bribery scandal, and the corruption and very dubious morals in the Labour government that stopped the investigation into it. However, it's pretty galling to hear that the US DoJ want to investigate that deal while their president is letting his friends out of prison for serious crimes. The Murdoch press wonder why there is what they consider to be anti-Americanism in this country. The answer is obvious - how can you have any respect for the American government with the current idiots in charge? They even make our lot look good. Like it or not, other countries judge you by the actions of your government, and if they carry on the way they're going then driving Jeeps into Glasgow airport will be the least of our worries.

Religious Exemptions

A magistrate in Manchester has walked out of a court because a defendant refused to remove a full-face veil, and this seems to have caused some controversy. Admittedly the magistrate could have handled it better than just walking out, but his point remains valid. You can't turn-up in court with your face covered - you could be anyone. Whose word do we have to take that this is actually the person who it should be?

I don't know how the law stands on this. Could anyone turn up in court with their face covered and expect everyone else to go along with it? Somehow I doubt it, and if it's true for one person it should be true for all people. We can't give special permission for people to be exempt from laws and conventions because of some belief they hold. Where would it stop? If it is indeed the case, then hey, my brand new and convenient religion forbids me to appear in court unless I'm provided with beer and strippers! I'm being silly of course, but how is that any more silly than the demands of any faith? They are all essentially made-up to fit some possibly questionable historical anyway.

It's time for the government to put its foot down and state that no religious 'rules' are valid for any exemptions or special treatments in any walk of life. It doesn't matter what your magic book or man with super powers from the past says - we are all equal, and we all have exactly the same rights, along with the same responsibilities. The overriding motivation behind any of our actions should be for society, not because we're scared of some mythical punishment that might befall us when we die. A life that is lived well purely because we fear a supernatural punishment is not worthy of admiration at all. It is to be pitied.

Honours and Dodgy Peers

So the honours have been announced, and they include a knighthood for Salman Rushdie. This is fine, after all, his novel Midnight's Children won the 'Booker of Bookers' as the best book in 25 years - quite an achievement really. It's a prize that is definitely deserved.

However, it was bound to upset some religious fundamentalists, who are still a bit upset that Rushdie wrote a book that they believe mocked their religion, or Mohammed, or something (most of them haven't read it so it doesn't matter anyway). This was to be expected, and ignored. However, when Labour peer Lord Ahmed waded-in and started saying he was "appalled to hear Salman Rushdie had been given a knighthood ... honouring the man who has blood on his hands, sort of, because of what he did, I think is going a bit too far". So then, Lord Ahmed, what did Rushdie do, exactly? In what way has he got blood on his hands? Is he the one suggesting that someone should become a suicide bomber and kill Rushdie, much like the oh-so-innocent Pakistan parliament? No, he was simply writing a piece of fiction, something that we have a right to do in this country. Why are you siding with religious nutjobs rather than someone you're actually meant to represent?

Lord Ahmed has no right to be representing Britain and should be sacked immediately. No, we don't cave-in to the lunatic demands of religions in this country. In fact we pander far too much to them as it is, and I'm not just talking about Muslims. No religion has any right to infringe on our basic liberties. They should all be ridiculed and mocked far more often for the backward, illogical, dangerous things that they are. Just because you believe in a big man in the sky who tells you to avoid pork, not use condoms, stone women to death or whatever, it doesn't make it a valid viewpoint. Why should we listen to you? Why should we even tolerate you when you start using your religion to reduce our liberties? By all accounts you can let your fairy tales and superstitions tell you what you can do with your own life, but as soon as you start affecting anyone else - including your own children... by God, you'd better to be ready to be ridiculed and mocked. Ignoring you hasn't worked after all, so it's time we told you exactly where you can stick your bigotry and intolerance.

Lunch With Simon Hughes

I've just got back from a buffet lunch where the guest speaker was Simon Hughes. It was good to finally hear him speak and see him face to face, as during the leadership election I got to meet the other candidates, but not Simon who was my favourite and who I voted for! Still, it was good to feel vindicated by my choice - he comes across as a genuine guy who cares about the issues that matter, such as social inequality.

It's nice to meet a politician who has genuinely been responsible for saving lives (he introduced legislation requiring landlords to have annual gas safety checks) - perhaps that's the biggest 'difference' any of us can make? I guess he just 'gets it', like most left-leaning politicians. The state is there to help society, not make the rich richer. It seems easy for people to forget that.

Budget

Yesterday's budget was a bit of a surprise really. With the current (and very welcome!) competition between the parties on who can be the most 'green' I expected more green taxes for one thing, yet the only real difference is a slight increase in fuel duty and a higher road tax for the most polluting vehicles, although the threshold for this is so high that it doesn't even cover most 4x4.

The move that surprised almost everyone was the 2p cut in the basic rate of income tax, although this came with the scrapping of the 10p band, so those on the lowest wages will actually pay more. Now I'm probably in the minority in thinking that we don't pay enough tax as it is, so I didn't want to see cuts to income tax. At least it wasn't to the higher rate payers I suppose. What was worse was the cut in corporation tax, although small companies now have to pay more. I hate these blatant bribes to big industry, so this move was pretty appalling. There were the predictable small increases to beer etc too of course (but spirits escape for some reason).

So anyway, where were the progressive moves? Where was the scrapping of car tax and big hike in petrol prices? Where was the duty on aircraft fuel? Where was some sort of sensible tax system on food miles? Or non-degradable packaging? Or incandescent light bulbs? What a wasted opportunity, and what's worse, this budget looked more Conservative than I would have expected from the Tories. I used to console myself that while we may have a Labour government it's probably better than a Tory one when it comes to wealth redistribution and the environment (we'll forget Iraq for a moment), but now I'm not so sure. What's the world coming to when you start wondering that if there can't be a liberal government, a Conservative one is the next best choice?

Wind Farms Don't Kill (many) Birds. Fact.

...well, not many anyway. A while ago now, David Bellamy accused wind farms of killing thousands of birds. Notwithstanding the fact that Bellamy, a childhood hero, has now gone mad and is gibbering on about things like global warming being made up, some people who are against wind farms noticed and starting using his support like it was some sort of argument winner.

Now it was clearly untrue (I've lived near windfarms and never noticed piles of dead birds), but without any peer-reviewed proof I was stuck. After all, buildings, cars, cats and so on kill far more birds and only an idiot would claim otherwise. I was therefore quite happy to see this study which shows that wind farms don't in fact kill any noticeable number of birds after all. Yay! I guess the NIMBYs, Neocons and other assorted idiots will now have to try to find another reason not to build wind farms other than the pretty selfish 'I don't like looking at them' argument.

The BNP lie - there's a surprise.

On my walk in to work this morning I was surprised to see the headline of the local paper. Apparently the BNP are running 'patrols' here in Bath, and the story was about the police saying it was a bad thing. Curious, I went to the paper's Web site where you can comment on stories and saw this.

At the time of writing nearly all of the comments are obviously from BNP members who have rallied to their 'cause' to put a positive spin on it. There are a couple of comments from normal people, including one who points out that some comments are from members who aren't local and have been told to lie about it. These are still in the minority though.

I obviously posted a comment myself but it was taken down within minutes. I thought it was reasonable, but perhaps the paper thought I was being too 'harsh' on the BNP. I don't know, but I think I've blown my chance. So here is a request - would anyone who reads this and realises that the BNP are in fact racist thugs (which is all of you, I suspect) please take two minutes to post a comment on the paper's site saying.. well, anything you like - it's your comment. I think we just need a better proportion of comments that aren't pro-BNP.

Who would tell us what to hate if it wasn't for the Daily Mail?

Whereas I could possibly accept that Daily Mail readers are simply misguided, most of the people who actually create it are clearly a waste of DNA. How the country can react so angrily to Jade Goody being a not-particularly-racist bully yet ignore the actually-racist and deeply, deeply vile Daily Mail is completely bizarre. I would include the Daily Express too, but their paranoid Diana fixation has relegated them from the world of 'newspapers'.

Anyway, I was reminded just how morally corrupt The Mail was today by two stories. Firstly the current investigation by the Commons Joint Committee on Human Rights into the incitement to hatred by the Mail and Express. The last few paragraphs in the BBC article just about sum the newspapers up really. However, what can the committee do anyway? I doubt they'll pass a law allowing you to slap anyone you see reading the Daily Mail and taking it seriously, even though that's probably exactly what we need.

In an unrelated and yet equally stupid move, Paul Dacre, the editor of the Daily Mail, ranted about politicians all loving the BBC. This is the BBC that has just been told it can't have enough money by the government of course... the BBC that was smacked-down by the Hutton report for telling the truth... the BBC that every Tory and most of Labour would like to scrap. What world is he living in? Well, that was a slightly rhetorical question of course since we all know he's living in a world full of scary immigrants who want to steal his job and kill his children. Of course he hates the BBC - it balances the world of the UK media a bit and counteracts some of the racist, homophobic, vomit-inducing output of his 'newspaper'. Paul Dacre, you are a loathsome man - don't you dare infect the minds of people who ignore your paper with your lunatic hate-filled jabberings.

PFI Deals and the NHS

'Private Finance Initiatives' are one of those scandalous realities that nobody except Private Eye seems to care about. With any luck more stories about it will appear in the mainstream media and people will notice. Take today's story on the BBC about how PFI firms will make a 23 billion pound profit from the NHS over the next 30 years. Think how many hospitals, operations and drugs could be bought for that much money... money which has come from the taxpayer to help the NHS, yet finds its way into the pockets of shareholders and CEOs.

While it is true that the current Labour government have increased NHS funding, most of the increase has been absorbed by private companies doing things much more expensively than they could have been done under a completely public NHS. PFI deals are great if you want to use figures from one particular year to impress voters, but they are much less impressive in the long term. If only the bigger picture was shown to the public then perhaps the madness would come to an end? The figures speak for themselves and are useful ammunition in the argument against involving the private sector in healthcare. While I am one of those absolutely opposed to it on moral grounds, it's always useful to have financial grounds to convince people who think with their wallets (or taxes).

I took the opportunity to sign-up as a member of Keep Our NHS Public. Let's hope this group gains some momentum and saves our public NHS before it's too late. Once it's all sold off then we face a greater struggle to get it back - just look at the railways...

Wind farms

Polly Toynbee's article in today's Guardian about wind farms makes interesting reading. NIMBYs are usually more of a bother than a benefit, since bad things (out of town supermarkets, nuclear power stations, airport expansions, etc) get pushed through anyway while good things get blocked. Wind farms are a case in point.

Being anti-wind farm is the default Tory position, whatever David Cameron may say. I've seen this effect myself with my parents. While naturally quite green, being paid-up Conservative members and reading the Telegraph and Spectator have taken their toll. They now have the strange flat-Earth style faith in bad science that Polly describes in the article. I guess it's inevitable if you just believe the right-wing press, but it bothers me that the Conservatives pretty much brainwash their members. 'Group think' and all that. Of course, the power of the right does come from ignorance and fear, but allowing this to help destroy the planet is going too far.

So, what are we to do? As the article says, a firm hand from Westminster is a good idea. It saddens me to see that some LibDem councils are just as bad and block wind farms too - they should be slapped-down for it. However, discipline from parties themselves doesn't go far enough. I think that wind farms and green energy in general should be made almost impossible for local councils to block. This sounds quite draconian, but let's face it, most people won't want one on their doorstep. It doesn't matter that they wouldn't want a nuclear power station either - those are so universally unpopular that they get forced through anyway. No, I'm afraid to say that where politicians depend on rural votes then there is a risk that they will block wind farms whatever they think of the environmental benefits. If they are forced through by the government then the council won't lose votes since they can't block them anyway. Problem solved.

While people are dithering about with tiny numbers of wind farms we're still killing the planet. It's time to get serious about building them on a massive scale. In the end, who cares what they look like if it means we are getting clean energy? Better that than global warming or a legacy of nuclear waste left for the next thousand generations.

Saddam Hussein

So Saddam Hussein was executed yesterday. I have my reservations about the trial itself and the fairness of it, although I wouldn't expect him to be found innocent of course. Whatever the outcome of the trial though, no society that wishes to consider itself civilised has any business condemning people to death. We are responsible for this really - the government hasn't been very vocal in its criticism of course, but apart from that, we generally have a policy of not turning prisoners over to countries where they may face execution. I believe that he was being held by the Americans, but in an ideal world we may have at least tried to influence them.

Objections to the death penalty aside, no good can come from this. A life in prison would have been a 'worse' punishment for him and wouldn't have turned him into a martyr. Also, there's bound to be knowledge that he had which has gone with him to his grave that we've lost - locations of graves, who helped him in certain crimes, and so on. Killing him is an act of vengeance rather than justice, just like every other execution.

Church and State

Hello, and sorry for the lack of posts recently. Normal service has been resumed.

The separation of church and state should be one of the fundamental objectives of anyone who supports democracy, so we should all take note when something happens that works against this goal. I noticed this story today about a couple of Christians campaining against homosexuals who have just received an out of court settlement from the police after getting into trouble for calling 'homosexual practice' morally wrong.

The article does not give a few key details, such as where the couple wanted the leaflets displayed. We can assume that it was a council property though, hence them asking Wyre Borough Council permission. It is therefore completely correct that the council refused, since it is not their place to help any church distribute its propaganda. The leaflets that the couples were objecting to were simply informing gay people of their rights, and were therefore exactly the sort of thing that the council should be distributing.

Let's leave aside for a moment the fact that the views of these people is bigoted, unpleasant, and down to some deeply objectionable beliefs. What we should be concerned with is the fact that they felt that they had to 'counter' a leaflet explaining someones rights with one containing their bigotry, which doesn't help anyone at all. Even worse, they expected facilities run by the council (and therefore at the tax payers expense) to aid them and their religion. This is fundamentally wrong, and the council were correct to refuse. I would argue that the police involvement went too far since free speech is important, and this ended-up being counter-productive. However unfair this may have been though, the state has no business distributing religious propaganda. I would encourage anyone living in Fleetwood to remind the council of this.

For a while now the public have seemed strangely happy with the fact that 'suspected terrorists' can be held without charge for an increasing amount of time. The government would like us to think that three months is reasonable. This has resulted in the somewhat scary ability of the government to lock anyone up as they feel like it without even having to say why. That's a power I can't see being abused, oh no.

This is all bad of course, but consider the poor Americans for a minute. The government there can lock you up on a whim indefinitely of course, thanks to their handy secret CIA prisons and popular Cuban bases. That was bad enough, but now they're about to pass a law that will allow them to torture you too. Granted, they won't be chopping off your hands, but they'll do pretty much everything else that doesn't leave a mark. Reading the linked article might well make you angry with the disgusting things some of their politicians are saying, but the scary thing is that they say them at all. Yeah, Democrats voting against this are 'helping the terrorists' by saying the government shouldn't torture people are they? Well, good on them. Not that the Democrats are much better of course, but at least they're not quite so obviously keen as fascism as the Republicans.

The fact that a 'cilivilsed' society is changing the law (and the Geneva Convention) to allow torture is appalling. Torture obviously doesn't work - you'd admit to anything if you were subjected to enough pain. Not only that, but if the US do it, there's the green light to all of their enemies to do it too. They've lost any high ground they may have had. As someone on Digg has said: "The provisions are intended to protect CIA interrogators from being prosecuted for war crimes." If you remember nothing else from that article, remember this.. And one more wise comment: When you allow your government to take away the rights of one group, you are destroying your own rights. If you believe this is a good thing then you do not deserve those rights.

Meanwhile, if you're a Christian and a terrorist, hey, it's ok, no torture or secret prisons for you!. Nice to see the same standards apply to everyone, isn't it?