Lone Wolf

This lot are really worth a listen. The best LP I've heard in ages. Well constructed complex and literate songs. I suspect that this lot will have a trajectory that goes outside the space that's normally reserved for rock bands. Listen to the whole LP here.

Labour leadership: four gambiteers and none worth an X

I'm quite depressed and pessimistic about the prospects for the Labour Party at the moment. As far as the leadership contest goes, I'm almost-but-not-quite adopting the Derby County v Leeds United approach (hoping they all lose). Mil perfectly encapsulates my view on this here. Likewise, I don't think that pyramids are a very sustainable management model for political parties any more, and I don't think the Labour will sustain one very successfully for very long.

I keep getting e-mails saying 'Join my campaign against....' this and that and I made a mental note early on not to vote for anyone who imagines themselves at the head of some parade with the rest of us just anonymously plodding on behind. This only leaves me with Diane Abbott to vote for as far as I can see and - with all due respect to her - I don't think she's ever been under any illusions about actually winning the contest.

None of these four boys have ever been in a fight in their lives. They were all parachuted into safe seats by a party leadership that prized compliance more highly than anything else. If anyone imagines that Labour can beat the Coalition in an election by using some clever fix that puffs up some Union General Secretary here, and ensures that some Regional Secretary will fix them there, then they are in for a very large disappointment.

And if anyone really imagines that Ed Milliband's pitch as 'the left candidate' is any more than a bit of short-term chessmanship, I hope they will have a stern word with themselves next time they look in the mirror. I've not seen any attempt to address the question of how Labour renews it's historic mission to promote collective action or to improve the participation of the widest section of the population in their own governance. The questions haven't even been broached. There's no politics on offer really. Politicking isn't the same thing. I've seen little evidence that any of them have any convictions that couldn't reasonably be described as a short-term gambit.

The nearest thing I've seen to an impressive statement was Ed Balls Bloomberg speech - admittedly, a good fine sweep over the issues of the day. He's a good columnist. But having met the bloke (admittedly, a long time ago) he's also an arrogant and charmless tosser who wouldn't be capable of any form of policymaking that doesn't involve some tablet of stone authored by himself and imposed by way old-fashioned arm-twisting. Expect years of bickering and backbiting if he gets anywhere near the new frontbench (as I'm sure he will).

I've not seen anything conversational in any of the candidates. I've not seen any pretense that the party itself may have more brains or experience as a whole than any of these Sonnenkind can draw upon from within their small circle of temporary allies.

We do need a leadership contest. We need the concept of leadership - as it is currently understood - to be contested and defeated. New Labour's approach to leadership was based upon a crude and self-serving notion of what was possible within the confines of a hostile media. It involved everybody conniving in the pretense that a single line that united the party could be pushed out to a credible media.

We are like every other party. We're not united. We never will be. We're a loose alliance of people who would object to each other being in government slightly less than we object to Cameron or Clegg. The other parties are identical in this respect - the only thing that changes is the identity of the hate-figures.

We need people in leadership positions who are prepared to do the dirty work of running towards arguments rather than away from them. The Tories didn't even win the election and they're acting as though they've got a 150-seat majority. Unfortunately, we've had a set of processes within our party for nearly 20 years that wrung anyone with this sort of backbone out of frontline politics.

That's why I'm pessimistic. I suppose Ed Milliband's shallow and unconvincing pitch to renew party democracy (it was so flimsy I didn't get beyond the first para - can't even remember where now) should appeal most, but I really can't imagine I'll vote for any of them at the moment.

At this rate, Diane will probably get my X as I labour under the illusion that it will somehow send a message to someone somewhere.

Awaydays

I've just seen that - for particularly problematic fixtures - clubs are starting to get more creative than ever in trying to minimise the risks around football games.

The deal that Leeds United have with Millwall now is that Lions fans can only buy vouchers for the game. They have to exchange them for tickets at a designated motorway service station (to ensure that they don't travel by train).

Projecting disappointment

I've just seen this on the Wikipedia page about the late Syd Barrett:

His sister denied he was a recluse or that he was vague about his past: "Roger may have been a bit selfish—or rather self-absorbed—but when people called him a recluse they were really only projecting their own disappointment. He knew what they wanted, but he wasn't willing to give it to them."

A few weeks ago, there was a thread on Slugger about Van Morrison and how his relationship with his audiences can often be abrupt and uncooperative. If you turn up to one of his gigs expecting a particular approach to his back catalogue, and that's not the one he's prepared for you .... well, tough luck.

The thing is, no-one would expect to go to see - say - Captain Beefheart (below) - and know what they're getting beforehand.



Van's (or, rather, his audience's) problem is that his recordings are, for the most part, serious attempts to do something interesting as well as sell-able. Unlike most musicians who have the capacity to do this, almost of Van's stuff has a large mainstream appeal. Some bits may disappoint the more critical fans, but none (I suspect) irks the larger less discriminating audience. It's the ease-on-the-ear of the recordings that creates the tensions with the audience, if you get my drift?

I saw him recently at the Hop Farm festival and it was almost heart-stoppingly good and memorable. It was quite a 'band-leader' experience in an odd way - he went around getting different musicians doing different things - pointing at them and conducting them and directing the show - I really think a lot of it was improvised.

There was one great bit in 'Baby Please Don't Go' where he pointed to the guitarist (who looked like he may not have known the song!) played the middle-8 riff to get him to pick it up (see almost at the end of the video I've found - below - 5 mins in), and then he pulled the harmonica out and played that part himself. He then took it into Mose Allison's Parchman Farm and the band looked like they were keeping up with him a bit - in a good way.

It was quite blissed out stuff a lot of time and he finished on 'In the Garden' with that 'no Guru, no method....' built up to a chant.

No encore or anything and as soon as he finished his vocal he was off the stage leaving the band to finish the set for a few minutes. I had friends who were working backstage and they said that as soon as he was off, he was into the waiting car and heading for the airport - probably on the motorway as his band played the last note.



Oh, one final thing: I was going to use this John Martyn video to make another point in this post but I've decided that the post (unlike the video) isn't worth showing to you (though you'll have to excuse the racial slur on the Irish at the end):

I'm sorry - I'll read that again

Smash the H-Blocks!

Er... sorry, that should read 'Don't Smash the H-Blocks'

(Nicked from the comments there)

Photo Opportunity

NI Unionist blogger Lee with a gentle warning to the DUP's Nigel Dodds.

Big Society: An opportunity for Labour?

This post by Anthony Painter on Labour List is easily the best commentary I've seen on how Labour should respond to the Tories' Big Society programme, insofar as it is a programme at all at the moment:

"[Labour] ...needs to be listened to again. That means a bit more honesty about where the party went wrong both in the context of the nodding dog leadership debate and the party more widely. It wasn’t just incumbency taking its toll or the unpopularity of the leader. It was also the fact that Labour was seen to have spent too much, too wastefully and had become a meddling, interfering government and a not particularly successful one at that. Acknowledging shortcomings is the first step to being heard."

and

"Labour needs to develop a way of talking about politics that is metaphorical, empathetic and tangible. The Tories play on simple themes such as the household budget as metaphor for the national budget. Well, most people would take out a loan for a car that enabled them to get to their job and enjoy their leisure time more or a mortgage to buy a home. That’s an investment and governments must invest also for a return. The left must do metaphor better.....

....Labour should not be afraid of articulating the importance of responsibility - for us all. Where it critiques the coalition, it must be on the basis of impact on people not policy detail.... Labour will only be listened to if its solutions are credible. It must articulate why the services and investments are important for all of us as individuals, for our communities and the nation. It must be clear how it would cut expenditure - or increase taxes - over what time and by what amount to make the bigger arguments. This is part of being heard again.

Labour must not look gift horses the mouth. Where the coalition is playing to an empathetic framing as it has on criminal justice and the Big Society - in thematics at any rate - don’t blindly oppose. Civic involvement is good for nurturing an empathetic mindset so encourage the Big Society and pledge to expand it and improve it. The easy option is to mock it. But what could be more compatible with an empathetic mindset than people becoming active in their local communities? Don’t forget, we are talking fundamental ways of thinking here: weaken the empathy then leave space for a conservative ideology to tighten its grip and that will have an impact across the whole of range of issues." (My emphasis)

Labour has a number of problems and opportunities arising out of the current situation. The Big Society programme highlights one further serious failing of the last Labour government: That it was captured by a managerial bureaucratic caste that was rigid and wasteful - one that refused to foster or acknowledge the existence of a public service ethos preferring outsourcing, inspection, bean-counting and permanent managerial upheaval. One that had only one measurer of value: Auditors.

There are no end of problems that the Tories will have with the implementation of this concept, not least it's near-addiction to Walter Mitty-type schemes promoted by mythical entrepreneurs and it's faith-based conviction that private sector investment will step in to replace the state spending that they are withdrawing (it really won't, and it's totally baffling to hear anyone claim otherwise).

There is a more sustainable Christian Socialist approach (one that you don't need to be a Christian to value, I'd add) that has prior claims to a lot of the Big Society ideas - but we (and presumably, the Lib Dems) can see where these ideas are simply a shill for privatisation and a Thatcherite buying-off of taxpayer lobbies.

We can also take some inspiration from this coalition government. We spent thirteen years governing as though we had a one-seat majority. It was ludicrously defensive and cautious. This lot haven't even won an election and they're already acting as though they have a 200 seat majority. There is an élan to this government that we never had - and I suspect that this is because they've resolved to take the FDA on and defeat them in a way that Labour never dared to (and should have done).

The Big Society idea - as it is articulated - is one that Labour needs to embrace. It has the potential to wean us off some of our more unattractive associations and help us to address the problems created by a politics that confuses individualism with liberty and democracy.

So, you might say, 'be nice to the Lib-Dems and embrace the whole Big Society idea - hardly the work of a defiant leftie?'

Maybe I'm getting old?

Attacking the Lib-Dems: Dos and don'ts

Don't....

Attack them for signing up for .... (insert regressive Tory-led policy here)

Do ....

Challenge them as to why they couldn't at least have got an agreement to ..... (insert cherished Lib-Dem progressive measure here)

The former will lead them to seek justification for their actions and elicit a defensive response. The latter will create problems between the leadership and the membership.

On being beastly to the Lib-Dems (continued)

Shuggy, in the comments, points approvingly to Blood & Treasure's take on how the Lib-Dems should be treated.

I'm not sure that they've accomplished their mission and should be treated as though they no longer exist - for a number of reasons, and rather than offering you a long post now, I'm going to let these observations out a bit at a time over the next few days.

My point for today is about how we understand what a political party is these days.

I don't buy the argument that the Lib-Dems (like their predecessors with the word 'Liberal' in their title) is simply a project "designed to get a share of power for their senior managers" - or rather, I do buy the argument to a certain extent (I'm sure it applies to Nick Clegg) but think that it applies to elements of all of the main parties.

It seems to me that a political party today is a coalition of different minority political interests that dislike the combined coaliton that makes up other parties more than they dislike the moderated coalition that makes up their own.

If the electoral system changes, I suspect that those coalitions will simply reconfigure slightly as different groupings become more prepared to hold their noses and get into bed with old adversaries in return for a crack at achieving a cherished goal / a sniff of power / getting their pictures in the paper.

The corollary of this is that each political party has been captured - however temporarily - by an unrepresentative social caste usually on the basis that it has persuaded the wider membership that their leadership will result in more electoral success.

This in turn effects our thinking on the question of being beastly to the Lib-Dems. If we keep shrieking at them, telling them that they're a bunch of Birkenstock Traitors, and so on, we run the risk of pushing the wider party into the ballast of Clegg's boat.

Surely, a more productive step would be to highlight the policy-areas where Labour has more in common with the Lib-Dem rank-and-file, while at the same time pointing out what a poor deal they've had from the Tories and how, if the electoral maths were to stack up in future, they would find that they'd have to make fewer compromises and achieve a good deal more by dealing with Labour?

All of that raises the question for next time: What do the Lib-Dems want?

Have a look at The Samosa?

I keep running into Anwar in London - he's a Manc of Pakistani extraction who blogs at The Samosa largely about the relationship between the Pakistani diaspora and Pakistan. This post for example:

One does not need to study Pakistan long or know it in any depth to realise that there is a huge need for reconciliation with India and a lot of unfinished business for both sides. Both sides must acknowledge the mutual hurt that still exists from the bloodshed of partition, and accept the shared culture, soil, peoples and history of the huge land mass and civilisations that make up India and Pakistan.

I spoke to a retired minister of defence who acknowledged that the majority in both establishments want this; it is how they get there that is fraught, given the above and of course the issue of Kashmir. This region needs as much attention as Israel and Palestine. The solution to Afghanistan is in large part also to be found here.

Being beastly to the Lib-Dems

I was on the House of Comments Podcast a few nights ago discussing Labour's approach to the Lib-Dems here. The shorter version of my own position is that, while it may be fun to bang on about Birkenstock Traitors, and it's a good bit of tonic for Labour's troops, that Labour's fire should all be concentrated on the Tories for reasons that seem, to me, to be obvious.

The reason I was on the podcast in the first place was to introduce a project called 'Political Innovation' (no link yet).

When clever kids are left to their own devices

This happens:

A question for people who work in financial services

My understanding of the details of how a lot of funds work is fairly basic, so I'd like to know if the following makes sense - would it be possible?

A lot of people have pensions, savings and endowment funds that are described as 'with profits' funds.

Am I right in understanding that the provider takes the monthly contribution and invests them across a basket of quoted companies that the provider believes will do well - striking the right balance between profitability and risk-aversion?

If so, would it be possible / easy for such a provider to launch a new fund - or offer an option to existing customers to switch to a modified fund - in which they could take a small degree of control over the fund. For instance, I could accept that Legal & General will make decisions on how 95% of my money is invested, but I could then direct them on the remaining 5% - and, say, ask them to invest it in a Football club of my choice (for example - I'm sure you could come up with an ethical alternative or one where the investor could chose to take a bit of a longshot).

Would it be possible / practical / affordable to do this? And could government do anything that would make it easier for the financial services industry to do this?

Football and Capitalist Realism

Via Will in the comments here, go and read this.

"Fans dream now not of their club being revivified by some Brian Clough-like managerial genius, but of it being saved by the largesse of a bored plutocrat. Barcelona famously have no shirt sponsor, and display the logo of UNICEF on their jerseys. United’s shirt sponsor is AIG, the insurance company at the heart of the financial crisis (according to The Economist, AIG’s “tentacles reach into every part of the economy.”) The neoliberal anti-utopia disintegrated with the bank bail-outs, even though it survives in an undead form as a set of defaults which continue to dominate social reality."

F U N E X?

Busy. Here are two tweets to be going on with:

1. People say 'footie' if they don't like football but want to ingratiate themselves with people who think they should like it. This is a rule.
2. To chose your voting system based on the result of a referendum is like using trial by combat to decide who wins the Nobel Peace Prize.

And I'm amazed that I got to be so old without ever seeing this guide to speaking Swedish:

Enlightenment thinking and political renewal

This is a very good post - well worth a read. Particularly the bit about consumer-politics.

One of the most obnoxious infections that hit New Labour was it's fear of presenting policies that contained components that would be resisted.

It took until very late in the term, for instance, for them to pluck up the courage to propose telephone levies - a policy that they were then not equipped to defend when it was attacked.

More on this later when I get time maybe.

A better type of electoral reform than the one that is being demanded?

Why not give every voter the option to break their vote into ten parts so that they can spread them around a bit?

This would surely allow people to respond to candidates more accurately?

Connectivity - good or bad?

A really interesting exchange about how far connectivity is a social good.

Stroke City: Another big day

If there hadn't already been enough happening around Ireland's North West coast, today, the good people behind the Derry-Londonderry UK City of Culture bid will be delivering their pitch in Liverpool. They're up against Sheffield, Norwich and Birmingham.

Now, with all due respect to them, these rivals will - I suspect - be handing in very managerialist bids. Ducks will be got in a row, business cases will be made and - who knows - this could result in the legacy of a new carrot-cake-and-coffee cinema!

Culture is where big important and exciting things happen. In Derry, they nearly fell out with each other over whether they should be bidding to be part of the UK City of Culture and then the usual squabbles went on quietly about the name and so on.

Derry has petty rivalries but sits, historically, on a gaping historical chasm that separates far more than just nationalists and unionists. It's a great little town and one that got into the souls of anyone who grew up in this country in the 1970s.

Our local Catholic church used to run schemes where kids of my age were brought over from Derry for a few quiet weeks away from carnage that was happening around them. Derry has stories to tell and narratives that need to be played out.

It's current iconography - whether it's Free Derry Corner or the murals showing kids in gas-masks priming up Molotov Cocktails, - is one that needs to be mashed up and worked over. One of the most stunning artifacts I've seen in a long time was the way that one of Anthony Gormley's manikins was necklaced (pdf) for some imagined sectarian transgression. It's one of the most stunning responses that I've ever seen to a work of art.

Any cultural focus that Derry gets over the next few years can make a huge difference to the city - and it could teach us all a few things we don't already know.

I hope the judges can get to understand this potential.

How to associate with women while not breaking purity laws

Take a drink!