Thursday, February 04, 2016 

"An extraordinarily nice man to work with" redux.

As an addendum to the recent post on Cecil Parkinson, worth sharing is Private Eye's tribute to the great man.  Which you'll probably have to click on to not strain your eyes.


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2/04/2016 09:52:00 pm | |

Monday, January 25, 2016 

Cecil Parkinson - "An extraordinarily nice man to work with".

Sex, power and politics have always made for a potent mix.  50 years down the line, the Profumo scandal is still written about, has plays dedicated to it, and become as much a cultural signifier for Britain in the 60s as the Beatles, the pill or swinging London.  The Profumo scandal is also at heart a tragedy - for both John Profumo, whose real offence was to lie to parliament about something that a few decades later would be considered far more sympathetically, and which he would spend the rest of his life trying to make amends for  - and Stephen Ward, who killed himself days before he would have been found guilty of the laughable charge of living off immoral earnings.

Also a tragedy, but for only the one side was the downfall of Cecil Parkinson, cabinet minister under Margaret Thatcher, who died today aged 84.  Parkinson, unlike say Alan Clark, who made up for his repeated infidelity and hard right views by being gregarious and leaving behind his gloriously indiscreet diaries, was an extremely unpleasant man who deserves to be known for the details of his affair far more than he does the political career ruined by it.

Like how, in a detail that appears in neither the FT's (written by Iain Dale) or the Telegraph's obituary, Parkinson successfully took out an injunction that meant Flora, the child he fathered with his secretary Sara Keays, could not be identified by the media in any way until she turned 18 - meaning that she could not so much as appear in school photographs, or take part in many school activities.  Meant supposedly to protect her, it had very much the opposite effect.  Then again, it's not wholly surprising when you consider that Parkinson had urged his mistress of 12 years to get an abortion, despite predictably opposing abortion as a politician.  In spite of repeatedly promising that he would leave his wife and marry her prior to the pregnancy, Parkinson kept the promise he made to Keays the night she broke the news of her pregnancy to him, that he would never have anything to do with her again and never wanted to see the child.

Indeed, Parkinson had to be dragged to court repeatedly by Keays to get the support she and Flora were entitled to.  As well as being diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, Flora was left disabled after an operation on a brain tumour at 4 years old.  Keays claims that Parkinson said at one point during their legal battles that Flora should be sent to an institution, something he denied.  On the expiration of the injunction Flora gave an interview to Channel 4 in which she commented, with understatement, that "I think my father has behaved very badly towards me".

This is the man paid tribute to today by our current Conservative masters of the universe, such as Andrew Feldman, chair of the party and caught up in the bullying scandal involving Mark Clarke, who said Parkinson made "an enormous contribution to the Conservative Party and to public life".  David Cameron described him as "part of a great political generation that did great things for our country", i.e. helping the only government worse than the current one to carry on winning.  William Hague said he was "an exceptional talent and an extraordinarily nice man to work with", which he probably was, at least until he found out you were pregnant with his child.  George Osborne, finally, tweeted of how Parkinson was "there in our hour of greatest need", after the Tory defeat in 1997.  How indicative of the man, how fitting an epitaph, that he was there when his party "needed" him but not when the lover he abandoned did.

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1/25/2016 08:43:00 pm | |

Tuesday, June 02, 2015 

The Charles Kennedy I didn't know.

In common with most of my fellow journalists commissioned to write about him following his untimely death, I never actually met Charles "Charlie" Kennedy, as he was universally known to all us political commentators.  A fearsomely tall man, muscularly built and with a booming voice, you most certainly would have seen him coming.

And yet from such low beginnings did this titan of Liberal politics rise to lead his merry band into the coveted third party position it wishes it still retained.  Born on the banks of Loch Lochbaer to parents from parts unknown, he fought against the twin barriers of being ginger and Scottish from the start.  Known as "Charlie" at school, he disdained the local custom of hanging around the local newsagents swigging from a bottle of Buckfast, and instead preferred to attend debates at the local corn exchange, where he first gained his liking for a wee dram or 13.  It was also here that he became known as something of a bruiser, objecting to a particular point of view from the local son of the manse, a certain Alex Ferguson, by giving him a firm punch on the bottom.  It was an incident that led to Ferguson never speaking to Chaz again, and a lifetime ban from Old Trafford.

Like so many young people, Chalkie had to leave school on finishing exams.  Despite an indifferent academic career up until that point, he was accepted by Glasgow University to read ancient Aramaic, a choice that seemed strange to everyone who knew him at that point as "Bluff" Charlie.  He nonetheless excelled, not only at his studies but also at anything he seemingly turned his hand to: Chattanooga swiftly became president of the student union, war correspondent for the Scotsman and also won the Watney's Red Barrel Have I Gone Blind Yet? championship 1981.  He likewise gained notoriety for his ability to seduce both male and female contemporaries, such was the raw animal magnetism he radiated at this stage in his life.  Later described as the Scottish Lynn Barber, it is estimated he slept with over 6,000 people in his first term alone.

Although offered the then vacant role of James Bond by MGM, Chaffinch knew his future lay in politics.  Unexpectedly winning the seat of Morose, Skye and Balamory at the first attempt for the nascent Dr Death Nuclear Doom party in 1983, he joined fellow future household names such as Geoffrey Dickens, Robert Kilroy-Silk and Gyles Brandreth at Westminster.  Such associations understandably led to the much too young Chappaquiddick taking solace in the bottle, to which he invariably returned throughout his parliamentary career.  As however by the standards of the time his drinking was considered to be social, only requiring medical intervention 4 times over the space of 5 years, it was little remarked upon.

Kennedy was by this point rising in the estimation of the Liberal Democrat party leadership, as the David Owen-led Doom party had dissolved into.  Charlie further built public recognition by appearing on a number of popular television shows, including That's My Dog, Supermarket Sweep, Bullseye and most notably, Have I Got News for You?, where he sat alongside Paul Merton trying to get a word in edgeways.  Such performances made him a natural frontrunner for the Lib Dem leadership after the sudden death of Paddy Ashdown in a tragic hat-swallowing stunt, winning the contest by a landslide, receiving 29 votes out of 30 in the membership ballot.

The great turning point in Charlie's political journey occurred with his decision to oppose the Iraq war.  Advised against rocking the boat from both within and outside his party, as well as warned by friend Alastair Campbell to avoid walking alone in woodland or up mountains, he ignored all such entreaties, going as far as to attend the 25 million strong 15th Feb 2003 protest in London.  He electrified the crowd with his "I don't think this war thing's a good idea, on the whole" oratory, and for a moment "Chaz-mania" swept the country.  Two years later he led his party to its best ever result in a general election, winning 62 seats in the Commons.

His success was also to be his downfall.  Impatient, ambitious colleagues within the party, concerned that his drinking would eventually cause it incalculable damage briefed extensively against him.  A last ditch effort by Kennedy to flush out his opponents in a leadership contest lasted all of a day before he resigned and accepted he would not stand again.  His successor, the 154-year-old Methuselah Campbell, himself only lasted 18 months in the role before he was smothered by Nicholas "Nick" Clegg.

Chaz returned to the wilderness, an embittered if still witty and well-loved figure, and was one of only three others in the party with the foresight to abstain on the vote on whether to go into government with the Conservatives in 2010.  His refusal to endorse the coalition did not save him from the great Sturgeon surge of 2015, losing not only his seat but also we must speculate in the most tasteless way possible much else besides.  In detail we journalists and his now talkative "confidantes" must discuss his demons and flaws, rather than wonder precisely how it was such a thoroughly decent man could be treated so shoddily and with such little respect by those around him who claimed to be his friends.  A party leader who was human enough to admit to a drink problem despite never being caught in public the worse for wear and yet was still punished for it?  Certainly, we shall not see his like again.

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6/02/2015 09:41:00 pm | |

Tuesday, April 01, 2014 

So many tears: Frankie Knuckles, 1955 - 2014.


For all the deserved plaudits rock and pop stars receive, few will end up being remembered as having inspired an entirely new genre, while even fewer could plausibly be described as helping to tranform popular music as a whole. Despite this, plenty of people this morning will have responded to news of the death of Frankie Knuckles with "who?"

Not that Frankie cared the slightest about his relative anonymity. Had he wanted to he could have played the superstar DJ game, or been the David Guetta of his day. About the closest he got to mainstream fame in his home country was when he won the inaugural best remixed recording Grammy in 1998, or more recently when a certain Barack Obama recognised his contribution to Chicago, renaming the street where the Warehouse had once stood after him. Instead he kept true to the sound he and others in the city had pioneered, first adding drum breaks and loops into the mix during live DJ sets, later along with Jamie Principle and David Morales among others producing the template from which so much of contemporary dance music and indeed pop in general takes its cue. There were of course other influences, as well as offshoots from the outset, most notably Detroit techno, with house progressing into acid house, but if rave culture as we know it can be traced back to anywhere, it's to the Warehouse and Frankie Knuckles.



Proud as we are (or at least should be) of the hardcore continuum, and with how it was this country more than any other that popularised house, it didn't begin at Shoom, with MDMA or illegal raves, but with tunes like Your Love.  Your Love was in fact produced by Jamie Principle, but credited to Knuckles.  Those he did produce, often with others, are no less seminal.  Under the alias Nightwriters he released Let the Music Use You, its riff since sampled and reused countless times, while the opening to Baby Wants to Ride is one of the most recognisable in all of house music.  Alongside Promised Land by Joe Smooth and Strings of Life by Rhythim is Rhythim (aka Derrick May), two other tracks stand up as being the very pinnacle of house, almost certainly never to be bettered.  Tears, produced with Satoshi Tomiie and featuring Robert Owens on vocals is simply an incredible piece of music, while Knuckles and Morales' Classic Mix of Alison Limerick's Where Love Lives is one of the greatest club tracks of all time, appearing repeatedly in top 5 lists.



As Alexis Petridis writes, despite the apparent contradictions in being a gay man and playing to what were at first predominantly gay crowds, there is a gospel influence to be heard in Knuckles' oeuvre, and in much early house music, just as there had been in disco.  The aforementioned Promised Land made it overt, carrying both a spiritual and emancipatory message, but it's also there in Where Love Lives and Knuckles' transformation of Toni Braxton's Unbreak My Heart.  This came full circle in 2008 with his gorgeous remix of Hercules and Love Affair's Blind, vocalled by Antony Hegarty of Antony and the Johnsons.

Apart from his own music, Knuckles' ultimate gift has been house.  Without house, there wouldn't have been hardcore.  Or trance. Without hardcore, there wouldn't have been jungle.  No jungle, no UK garage, no drum and bass. No UK garage, no grime or dubstep, and arguably, considering its debt to "purple" grime and dubstep, no trap.  Naturally, without house we would also have been spared the Guetta Euro-dance sound that has dominated the past few years, yet all things considered it's been a small price to pay.  More than that, Knuckles remained consistent to the very end, never deviating, at one point stepping back from production as harder styles not to his liking took popular preference.  Fashions may change, but just as disco has seen a resurgence, so house will always come back.  Frankie, thank you.

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4/01/2014 10:12:00 pm | |

Friday, March 14, 2014 

Tony Benn 1925 - 2014.



Maximum respec Mr Benn. Maximum respec.

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3/14/2014 01:31:00 pm | |

Wednesday, April 17, 2013 

We are all bourgeois now.

As unhappy coincidences go, today's announced rise in unemployment seems as fitting a tribute to Maggie as anything else.  We all Thatcherites now, says David Cameron, and while you can't level the accusation against him that he believes unemployment an acceptable price to pay for his overall reforms, especially considering no government since has believed in full employment, his government is going way beyond Thatcher's obstinacy on economics.  She after all did relent to an extent when monetarism sent the economy into free fall; Cameron and Osborne seem likely to ignore the advice of the highest priests of neoliberalism, the IMF, to scale back on austerity, such is the way they've made it impossible to do so without humiliating themselves.

Just as I didn't watch the royal wedding (and why on earth would anyone, for that matter?), I somehow managed to avoid the funeral.  Quite why so many find something to admire in our ability to put on pageantry when required equally escapes me; authoritarian nations also tend to be pretty good at putting on a show, and yet with the exception of the opening ceremony at the Beijing Olympics, we usually make fun of them precisely on that basis.  Just as the only reasonable reaction to goose-stepping soldiers is to laugh at them, so the pomp and circumstance that surrounds the monarchy and also now the chosen few regarded as being the equivalent of royalty ought to be mocked.  It is utterly ridiculous, almost everyone except for the dewy-eyed few know it to be ridiculous, and so undoubtedly this ridiculous tradition will continue to be rolled out for every major state event, such are our ways.

If nothing else, today has at least been revealing of how politicians regard each other in private.  Both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were first elected to parliament in 1983 on "the longest suicide note in history" manifesto, but neither it seems had any objection to Thatcher being given a quasi-state funeral.  Indeed, it seems the only major thing the Tories added to the plans drawn up under the last government was the military aspect.  They might not have known that the right would take the opportunity of her death to attempt to portray her as second only to Churchill in the great national figure stakes, yet if they've had any such concerns since they certainly weren't on display today.  Nor has the week of hype and eulogising left the Mail drained; if anything, it's reached such a peak that you doubt they'll be able to top it when Liz pops her clogs.  "A journey's end", the front page read, while below they claim up to 250,000 were lining the route of the procession (since changed to a more realistic 50,000).  Just as you have to multiple the figures given by the police for any demonstration other than one by the Countryside Alliance by the power of 4, so it now seems you have to divide the numbers given by the Mail by the same amount.

Nor was the ceremony itself beyond critique.  Today wasn't the time and place to discuss her politics, said the Bishop of London, Richard Chatres, who then decided at the end that it actually was as he defended her over the infamous "no such thing as society" comments.  She did believe in society, and the interdependence of people, he said, which is almost certainly true; what went unsaid was that however you read her remarks, she clearly said people shouldn't even expect to be housed by the state. I don't think anyone disputes that first and foremost our responsibility is to look after ourselves; it's that a majority of us still believe that the state should provide an adequate safety net, whether that be in housing or benefits. Society is not the state, as the Tories said at the last election, but Thatcher's government did more to fray the threads that tie communities together and make up society than any since the war.

The real irony of today is that for all their tributes to her, not to forget George Osborne's solitary tear, Cameron spent his first years as Conservative leader trying to repair the damage her overthrow did to the party. Arguable as his overall success has been, the last week has been a reminder to everyone that her legacy is still inescapable.  To suggest this is unlikely to go down well in those places that the Tories need to win to get a majority next time out is to put it too lightly.  The overwhelming mood might be apathy rather than anger, such as that in Leeds and Edinburgh rather than Goldthorpe, yet you shouldn't bet against Labour using a few of the images of the past week come in 2015, hypocritical in the extreme or not.

This said, Cameron was right in saying we are all Thatcherites now.  At least he was if he was meant the political class, as they clearly are all Thatcherite in one sense or another.  A significant number of the population by contrast remain in favour of an alternative, it's just they aren't so much as offered one. Nor are they likely to be. And eventually, something is going to break.

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4/17/2013 09:54:00 pm | |

Monday, April 15, 2013 

A small, ridiculous gesture for a massive, undignifed death jamboree.

One of the problems that comes from Labour deciding to just let the Tories have their week of mourning/deification with the very minimum of criticism is that you let the likes of George Galloway represent what a significant amount of people are thinking.  It was an utterly absurd, cowardly move for the BBC to not play Ding Dong in full, instead opting for the typical compromise that pleased neither side.  I really thought we'd moved past the point at which things that were in poor taste were banned/censored due to outside pressure, not least when it comes to music.  There's plenty of music in the top 40 that's offensive in terms of how objectively awful it is, but if people buy it, it gets played.  It's how the system works.  Start altering that and it renders the entire exercise even more completely and utterly pointless than it already is.  Also, regardless of what Guido or the Mail think, for 52,000 people to buy a song in one week purely as a protest only underlines how the attempts to claim Thatcher as our greatest peacetime prime minister are a step too far.

And so now Big Ben is to be silenced for the duration of Saint Margaret's funeral.  It's a small, ridiculous gesture for what is turning into a massive, undignified summation of how for all Thatcher's rolling back of the state, the parts that were in most need of trimming are still fully functioning.  Turning your back on the entire charade really does seem to be the best possible way to register discontent with what has been a fully fledged political campaign from the moment the news of her death came through.

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4/15/2013 08:32:00 pm | |

Thursday, April 11, 2013 

A political Queen.

Writing about Thatcher (and politicians in general), it's easy to forget that behind the often harsh, apparently uncaring exterior, there was a real, feeling woman who clearly was capable of great kindness as well as denouncing her opponents in the strongest of terms.  One of the more myth-squashing anecdotes from yesterday's Commons and Lords sessions was Lord Butler's retelling of how a student challenged her on referring to children as "illegitimate", despite their parentage not being something they had any control over.  Thatcher responded that it was better than calling them the alternative (bastard), yet later she reflected to Butler that having thought about it, the student had been right.  Looking at the photograph taken of her in Battersea Park only last month, I was reminded of my grandmother's passing last year, who also spent her final years battling with dementia.  Regardless of what we do with our lives, at the end every single one of us dies the same way, alone.

All the more reason why we shouldn't let Thatcher be remade into what is effectively political royalty.  The way Tory MPs tried to shout down both David Winnick and Glenda Jackson yesterday may well be typical Commons behaviour which all sides are often guilty of, yet it was surely inappropriate when so many of their colleagues made tributes that went far beyond the sycophantic and instead into the most slavering hero worship.  The idea she had any role in the fall of the Soviet Union beyond her early picking out of Gorbachev is absurd, as is her much overstated love of freedom.  She believed in it for those under Communism, not so much those under authoritarian regimes that were British allies.

Fair enough, David Cameron clearly admires her deeply, and so his rhetorical flourishes can be forgiven.  Ed Miliband also acquitted himself well, making a well-judged speech that covered both the good and the bad without riling either side. It's also unclear just how much of the planning for the funeral was done by which government: we now know Operation True Blue dates back to around 2006, indicating that some sort of public remembrance was going to take place regardless of who was in power. Which would have been fine. A ceremonial funeral goes well beyond that, giving her the same status as a royal, ignoring how one of the reasons we continue to grudgingly put up with Brenda is that she has stayed resolutely above politics.

The comparison is apt, because much as any criticism of Liz is treated as being akin to a modern form of blasphemy, so it seems the likes of the Mail now want Maggie to get the same treatment. As predictable as the outrage was from the usual suspects at those not treating their heroine's death with the due amount of respect, the Mail's pursuit of those behind one such death party is incredibly petty. Splashing two days in a row on the opponents rather than celebrating Thatcher's life and legacy seems a really odd way to go about things.

Then again, perhaps the Mail thinks focusing on the beastliness of some is the only way to win over those it would normally consider its natural allies.  To judge by the ratings the tribute programmes hastily screen on Monday picked up (3 million) and the number of views news stories on the major websites have received since, Thatcher's demise and the circus that has followed since might be fascinating the politics nerds (guilty), but it doesn't seem to be transfixing many others.

And why should it?  Those born on the day she left office are now 22, while the passing of time for those older appears to have dulled both the interests and opinions of the majority.  Moreover, we can either bemoan or celebrate her legacy, but none of the mainstream political parties want to truly break with it.  The battles she fought appear to be all but over, while her main disciple is urging Ed Miliband to not so much as inch leftwards.  Looks as though, yet again, it's up to the next generation to break the spell Thatcher cast over British politics.

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4/11/2013 09:11:00 pm | |

Tuesday, April 09, 2013 

Thatcher's victories.

The only appropriate response yesterday seemed to be to mock.  Thatcher had become and will remain a myth, for both right and left.  For her most devoted followers on the right, and for an example of the loopiness she has on even those usually most staid of academics, historians, one only need read the Graun's interviews with Michael Burleigh and Andrew Roberts, she was a giant who will never be equalled.  It doesn't matter to them how many communities her policies ripped the heart out of, how many lost their jobs as an effect of her repudiation of the attempts to maintain full employment of the post-war years and were thereafter bought off with incapacity benefit, or how the ultimate effect of the castration of the unions was the soaring inequality we have today (or if it does, they rationalise it as unavoidable collateral damage).  They really, genuinely, believe that she saved the country as David Cameron said yesterday.

Equally, for some on the left, Thatcher became the ultimate depiction of the nasty, heartless, even evil Tory.  There is no such thing as society, she said, and that quote came to symbolise how they felt she cared nothing for the working man who wanted little more than a secure job and a roof over his head.  If he wanted to buy that house, then that was different, he became "one of us".  All the rest could be disregarded, or if they were actively hostile, they could be characterised as the "enemy within".  The previous solidarity of local communities and workplaces was broken down through such rhetoric, while the police were used, whether against the miners or the strikers at Wapping as her effective line of enforcement.

As you might expect, my own view on Thatcher is closer to that of the latter rather than the former.  It's difficult to draw such a broad conclusion though when she resigned as prime minister 5 days shy of my 6th birthday.  Indeed, one of the many absurdities of yesterday was that so many of my generation and younger were either celebrating or certainly not feeling the slightest bit sad about the death of someone they could either barely remember as being in power or had resigned years before they were even born.  I don't have very solid memories of much before I was about 7, although I can extremely vaguely recall the news of the poll tax riots.  As for her political passing, there's just a blank.  I might be a child of Thatcher, but actually remember her time? I certainly don't.

Britain in 2013 is nonetheless still her country.  It's undoubtedly a more socially liberal and multiracial place than it was in the dying days of 1990, but economically it resembles it more closely than it has in years previous.  Enterprise zones, straight out of the Thatcherite handbook are back, as is the language of there being no alternative. George Osborne even lifted directly from her for his budget slogan, that it was one for those who want to "work hard and get on", as tactless a message as we've come to expect from the sledgehammer chancellor.

It's here where a certain section of the left's demonisation of Thatcher begins to fall apart.  To understand what she achieved, you don't just have to be aware that not a single one of her privatisations, financial reforms or trade union laws was unpicked by Labour between 97 and 2010, but also that support for her was so total from the vast majority of the media that it forced everyone that has come since into trying to ride the press tiger.  All have tried, and all have failed, although John Major refused to play the game to anywhere near the extent that Blair, Brown and Cameron did.  It's been said repeatedly that New Labour was Thatcher's greatest achievement (including by herself), and it's one of those rare cases when such a widely shared view is probably right.  In fact, New Labour didn't just keep to her settlement, it expanded on it: one of Gordon Brown's very first acts as chancellor was to give away the only remaining power that the Treasury had kept, that of raising and lowering interest rates.  The free market was triumphant.  That Labour would have almost certainly won in 97 regardless of Tony Blair's transformation of the party is now just another of those what if scenarios.

Although I disagree with plenty of the Heresiarch's analysis, he's right to note that the most fundamental difference between the New Labour machine and that of Thatcher was language.  New Labour (initially at least) spoke compassionately and continued to denounce the evils of Conservatism while going far further than she had dared in many areas.  Whereas she may not have cared two hoots for the NHS, she didn't introduce privatisation, as New Labour did; nor were the unemployed or others on benefits denounced in anywhere near the terms that became familiar in the final years under Labour (Tebbit's "on yer bike" anecdote about his father aside, although the denunciation of single mothers wasn't many moons away).  The use of the private finance initiative boomed, while the City was allowed to do whatever it liked, and duly did.  Thatcher undoubtedly wanted as many as possible to get rich, but she never said anything amounting to the immortal line uttered by Peter Mandelson.  She also might have loathed anything that wasn't bourgeois while having no interest in wider culture whatsoever, but she didn't expand the prison estate in the way her successor and then Labour did, or impose the restrictions on civil liberties Labour did in the aftermath of 9/11, despite almost being murdered by the IRA.

While then it was at least nice to hear one alternative voice yesterday, and it's difficult to disagree with Ken Livingstone that Thatcher's reforms set the political failures on housing and the City we're living with today into motion, his opponents were also right when they stated back that his party did nothing to change them and in some cases have ended up exacerbating the problems.  Just then as Thatcher lay the foundations for New Labour, so too did New Labour set the foundations for David Cameron's Tories and the coalition.  David Cameron's attempt to rebrand the Tories has undoubtedly been more spin and less substance than the remaking of Labour was, yet it just about worked.  That in power almost all of the fluffiness has fallen away and been replaced by some incredibly harsh rhetoric isn't just a mirror on the 80s, it's also how Blair and Brown operated when they thought they had to.

You can't imagine though that when either Blair or Brown go there will be impromptu street parties to mark the occasion.  Thatcher wasn't just divisive, as has been admitted even by Cameron, she polarised the country.  Apparently capable of great charm and kindness in private as well as rudeness, her public demeanour inspired hatred.  You were either with her or against her, a position only Tony Blair has since invoked.  For all the claims of how she was an inspiration for people in the Soviet bloc and had a passion for freedom, this only went so far.  If you were unlucky enough to be under the yoke of a dictatorship of a British ally, whether in Chile, Indonesia or Saudi Arabia to name but three, then hard luck.  The same went for the ANC in South Africa; she may well have opposed apartheid, but she continued to refer to Nelson Mandela as a terrorist and refused to impose sanctions on the regime.

All the more reason why yesterday we should have heard more widely from those who opposed her at the time.  The closest the mainstream came to acknowledging the depth of feeling of some, not to mention what was happening online were the one or two interviews with miners, with Red Ken and Shirley Williams turning up on Newsnight, alongside the odd reference to George Galloway's tweeting.  The 80s were hardly a sanitised era, and Thatcher herself was ruthless in her attacks on the media when they refused to follow the Conservative line, particularly the BBC, although perhaps most notoriously when Thames broadcast Death on the Rock.  Nor was there much, if any comment on the continuing censorship during her decade in power: the video nasty panic and the influence of Mary Whitehouse on Thatcher went unremarked upon.

Nor should it have been decided so swiftly that she would receive a ceremonial, if not state funeral, although the difference is frankly semantic.  Regardless of what you think of Churchill as a politician both before and after the war, his leadership during the conflict demanded that he receive full state honours when he died.  He worked to unite the nation and give it the belief to fight on.  Thatcher did the opposite of the former, while indirectly promoting a class conflict that continues to this day.  If the family wanted a public event, then by all means they could have either paid for it themselves (as they are doing in part) or had it privately funded.  Those pushing for a full state funeral should note that if Thatcher deserves one, then when Blair goes he will also surely merit such recognition.  It will also inevitably attract much protest, which raises the question of how it's going to be policed.

The ultimate conclusion to draw is that as always, it's the victors that end up writing the history.  Where the left has arguably succeeded socially (although there is much still to do) the right has most definitely triumphed economically.  What Thatcher and Reagan instituted in the 80s ought to have been exposed by the crash of 07/08 and the depression that has followed.  Instead, after a initial bout of Keynesianism, neoliberalism has re-emerged if anything stronger than ever.  There is, we are told, no alternative.  They're right, as the left has completely failed to set out that alternative.  Thatcher won then, and her successors are doing so now.

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4/09/2013 07:19:00 pm | |

Monday, April 08, 2013 

Death to penguins!

  • GREATEST WOMAN TO HAVE EVER LIVED, DECLARE BLAIRITES
  • GREATEST WOMAN TO HAVE EVER LIVED, DECLARE LABOUR MPS TOLD TO BE ON BEST BEHAVIOUR
  • WHO'S JOSEPHINE STARCHER, ASKS EVERYONE UNDER 16

Madam Josephine Starcher, the first and so far only female British prime minister has died at the age of 106, her chief propagandist Lord Ho Ho has announced.

Struggling to hold back the tears and dressed entirely in black, the normally jovial Ho Ho delivered his message to the massed ranks of the British press, knowing that this was a truly historic moment.  "This is a truly historic moment.  Madam Starcher is dead.  She choked on a Ritz cracker.  Mark and Carol Starcher have asked for the utmost media intrusion at this time.  As a supporter of a free press, it's what their mother would have wanted."

From humble upbringings, born into a family of fish gutters, Madam Starcher rose to be one of the defining political personalities of the 20th century.  Abandoning a career in turning the windmill round at the local crazy golf course, she joined the Conservative party, influenced heavily by the political philosophy of the German panel beater Herman von Paddle Steamer.  Realising that his aquatic based economics were rather antediluvian, she soon settled on the far more sensible writings of Fredrich von Hayek.

First selected by the Tories to contest the safe Silly Party seat of Luton, she nonetheless succeeded in reducing their majority by first 10 and then a further 5 votes.  It was not until 8 years later that she finally entered parliament, having won the London seat of Finchley thanks to a mistake on the ballot which listed her as the Ayn Rand Continuity party candidate.  The electorate were rather miffed at first to have elected someone so moderate, but soon took Starcher to their hearts.

Starcher's first taste of real power was as education secretary in the Conservative government of 1970.  Given the position by noted sailor and bon vivant Samuel O' Beckett, who approved of her past flirtation with the works of von Paddle Steamer, she excelled in the job, with her decision to introduce Turkey Twizzlers onto the lunch menu of every school in the country welcomed by all, especially newspaper owner Sir Bernard Matthews.

Rising to become leader of the party after O' Beckett mysteriously fell off a barge into the Grand Union Canal, she fought both sexism and the patronising mentality within the Conservatives, many of whom kept mistaking her for the charwoman right up until her resignation in 1990.  She nonetheless led the Conservatives to victory in 79, the Labour party's policy of discounting tents for summer holidays having been a unmitigated disaster for the country.

Once ensconced in Downing Street, she set about introducing reforms which were controversial from the outset.  At first, it seemed as though her policy of "Voucherism", whereby money was abolished and vouchers given out instead was leading Britain towards ruin, as unemployment increased by 25 million and a 6 hour week had to be put in place.  Criticised and cajoled by the "damps" in her cabinet, she gradually reintroduced money and later claimed that she had never supported voucherism at all.

Despite this set back, her first term came to be defined by the Rockall war.  The tiny island was invaded in 1982 by penguins who declared a socialist state, much to the dismay of the local population of British gannets.  Intervening on the side of the gannets, who she believed shared her political philosophy, the war lasted 30 minutes and cost the lives of approximately 59 penguins.  1 British soldier took a peck to the groin.  The successful action came to be the seen as the turning point in the government's fortunes, and the slogan "death to penguins" was a rallying cry for young Conservatives everywhere during the 83 election campaign.

Her second term was dominated at first by a strike by sewage workers, whose campaign of civil disobedience came to a head when they almost killed Starcher with a massive "shit cannon" blast in Brighton.  After defeating their leader Captain Crabs, she set about privatising much of the country's infrastructure, starting with the state owned glass eye maker.  Her victory in the 87 election assured, concerns began to be raised that power had gone to her head.  Her edict that every man, woman and the child in the country with the exception of nuns and the insane had to cut off their left ear, legislation that became known as the "ear tax", resulted in riots in Victory Square.  Challenged for the leadership of the party by Didbin Jane, she failed to win on the first ballot and was persuaded to stand down, leaving Number 10 with noticeably wet armpits.

In a sign of the unanimity of feeling across the political spectrum, a joint statement on Starcher's death has been issued on behalf of David Cameron, Ed Miliband, Nick Griffin and Nigel Farage:

"Truly, Starcher was the queen of hearts.  She cured the blind, healed the sick, and only once did she call for everyone to cut off their left ear.  Her successes were numerous, and the country was transformed from the hell hole it was in 79 to the paradise it continues to be today.  She literally single-handedly defeated the Soviet Union, the evil empire collapsing like a pack of cards with one swish of her right hook, while she also established the enterprise culture that today means anyone can take out a payday loan on an APR rate of 600,000%.  We hope that all will join us in saying one last time, death to penguins!"

Nick Clegg was unavailable.

The response elsewhere has been mixed.  In Scotland, where many of her policies were first tested out, a mass event appears to be taking place in Glasgow's George Square, although reports are unclear about whether or not the mass drinking is usual for a Monday.  Also indifferent it seems are the young, many of whom appear to be unaware of the legacy left for the country by Starcher.  One 15-year-old asked for his opinion merely grunted and then walked off, while a 17-year-old left the following message on Twitter:

"Everyone in politics is a fucking fag."

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4/08/2013 03:07:00 pm | |

Monday, September 10, 2012 

1924 - 2012.


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9/10/2012 10:12:00 pm | |

Friday, January 20, 2012 

Etta James, 1938 - 2012.


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1/20/2012 05:30:00 pm | |

Friday, January 06, 2012 

Poetry corner.

In Memoriam

So. Farewell then
Bob Holness.
Host of Blockbusters,
Actor and
Non-saxophonist.

"Can I have a P
Please Bob?"
Yes. That was
Their catchphrase.

Now it seems
You're the one
With a D.

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1/06/2012 07:33:00 pm | |

Friday, December 16, 2011 

Christopher Hitchens, 1949-2011.


I often grandly say that writing is not just my living and my livelihood but my very life, and it’s true. Almost like the threatened loss of my voice, which is currently being alleviated by some temporary injections into my vocal folds, I feel my personality and identity dissolving as I contemplate dead hands and the loss of the transmission belts that connect me to writing and thinking.

These are progressive weaknesses that in a more “normal” life might have taken decades to catch up with me. But, as with the normal life, one finds that every passing day represents more and more relentlessly subtracted from less and less. In other words, the process both etiolates you and moves you nearer toward death. How could it be otherwise?

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12/16/2011 02:50:00 pm | |

Friday, July 22, 2011 

Lucian Freud, 1922 - 2011.

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7/22/2011 10:17:00 pm | |

Tuesday, October 12, 2010 

In tribute to Claire Rayner.

One of Chris Morris's less deserving victims, but oh so funny, which I sadly can't embed. She was also on one of the best ever Have I Got News for You episodes, from the series when Paul Merton was on a sabbatical.

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10/12/2010 10:28:00 pm | |

Wednesday, March 03, 2010 

Michael Foot, 1913-2010.

It's become a cliché to say when someone truly great or stratospheric passes away that we'll never see their like again, yet I challenge anyone to say that it isn't true of Michael Foot, who has died aged 96. Not only was he the last socialist to lead the Labour party, something which will certainly never happen again, but he was also the last great, genuinely principled leader of any mass political party. In an age where presentation and pretence trump integrity and honesty every time, we've lost one of the few remaining reminders of why politics truly matters, something which challenges even the most committed and well-meaning of us at times.

Foot will partially be so fondly remembered because he lost, and as a nation there's little we love more than a romantic loser. Who knows what kind of prime minister he would have made had history been different, but he could hardly have been worse than the alternative. It was as a parliamentarian though that he truly excelled, and he's bequeathed us one of the greatest insults in the House of Commons during the 20th century, accusing Norman Tebbit of imitating a semi-trained polecat every time he rose to speak. Nigel Farage take note. He was never more right than when he made the unquestionable point that "most liberties have been won by people who broke the law", something completely anathema to today's generation of Labour politicians to whom the state in all its guises is never wrong.

As a 17-18-year-old it was Foot's even more left-wing nephew Paul who I wanted to emulate: the investigative journalist who through his campaigns freed more innocent people than almost any other in this country. When he died back in 2004 it was the tribute and image painted of the two men in Private Eye which has always stayed with me: the comedic vision of the two Feet, walking down a London street, arguing and debating as they went, both gesticulating to make a point with their sticks, other pedestrians fleeing from their path. That both have now left us is deeply sad, but the memory of these two great contributors to British cultural and political life will live on for a very long time yet. As the Guardian's obituary finishes:

Michael gave love and earned love as few politicians do in any age. He was wonderful company, a marvellous comrade, a magnificent man, a great socialist and libertarian. The only tribute that he would want, the only memorial that would do him justice, is enduring application of his values in the cause of progress.

Let us give him that.

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3/03/2010 10:15:00 pm | |

Friday, January 18, 2008 

We'll build this rook house here for Bobby.

Bobby Fischer 1943 - 2008

Mr Eugenides on the genius, recluse and antisemitic loon.

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1/18/2008 09:17:00 pm | |

Saturday, November 10, 2007 

I believe in nothing but it is my nothing.

I am stronger than Mensa, Miller and Mailer
I spat out Plath and Pinter
- Manic Street Preachers, Faster.

Only Pinter left.

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11/10/2007 08:30:00 pm | |

Saturday, May 19, 2007 

Farewell to Falwell.

Generally, it's regarded as distasteful to dance on the graves of the recently deceased. Honestly though, what other possible reaction is appropriate when the world has been sadly deprived of another bigoted, hate-preaching apocalyptic false prophet?

Jerry Falwell became world infamous when he so accurately pointed the finger of blame shortly after the 9/11 attacks. Rather than going with the general feeling that this had been an attack by 19 inadequates armed with boxcutters and fundamentalist Salafi Islam, he instead remarked, while talking to Pat Robertson, a fellow nut-job:
"I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen.'"

 Who could possibly disagree with such a refined opinion? Then again, how could Jerry Falwell, who believed in the very same God that the hijackers did, who hated the same people that they did, and who probably would have found much in common with their views on society itself had they ever met, point the finger at those who were actually responsible without attacking his own creed?

Whenever such enlightened fellow members of the human race depart from this mortal coil, I can't help but imagine by indulging their own beliefs just where they would turn out to have gone. There's surely no contest in this case: Falwell went straight to hell. Since the beginning of Falwell's preaching, the Devil will have had plenty of time to think up just how best to torture this hater of homosexuals, abortion and illicit sexual relations. It wouldn't just involve Falwell being made a bitch for the rest of eternity in burning damnation; that would be too obvious and nowhere near enough punishment for someone who spent the best part of his life persecuting those who simply had different beliefs and lifestyles to those he favoured. No, Falwell wouldn't just be receiving everlasting, continuing death by mau mau, he'd be forced into having unprotected sex with just the sexually liberated women he condemned, only for them to become pregnant and then abort his love children right in front of his face, all while being jumped up and down on by Tinky Winky, another of his targets.

Thankfully for Falwell, who failed to follow the two main teachings of the person whose message he supposedly spent his life spreading, loving your neighbour as yourself and extracting the rafter from your own eye before pointing out the one in your brother's, neither hell nor heaven exist. He is instead at peace, which is something that can't be said for those campaigning for their own rights, such as gay marriage to be recognised, who are still being discriminated against with plenty of thanks to the power of his organisation over America's politicians. There is one bright spot; his hatred of those with a different sexual orientation wasn't enough to appease another branch of well-known lunatics: the Westboro Baptist Church has announced that it will be picketing his funeral (PDF).

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5/19/2007 07:42:00 pm | |

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