Bacteria and viruses are fighting back, but will big pharma save us?
January 25th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
“An apocalypse is looming, warn the public health experts. The spectre of a benighted world where humankind again falls prey to bacterial plagues, wiping out the frail and the young, has been hanging over us for many years now. Infections we have conquered, such as pneumonia and typhoid, will return to kill us. Surgery and chemotherapy for cancer will carry huge risks.
It’s a distant scenario as yet, but it cannot be dismissed as alarmist rhetoric. Antibiotics are no longer the cure-all for bacterial infections that they once were. Antimicrobial resistance is real. Microbes – both bacteria and viruses – are fighting back, developing resistance to the drugs invented to wipe them out. It’s an evolutionary thing. Bugs were here before we were and are evolving to survive us.”
These are the opening paragraphs of a story in today’s “Guardian” news paper which I found fascinating if disturbing. Sometimes the threats to humankind are not as visible as for instance is the case with climate change.
Posted in Science & technology | Comments (0)
Was the Munich Agreement of 1938 inevitable or avoidable?
January 23rd, 2019 by Roger Darlington
Before I read the historical novel “Munich” by Robert Harris, I decided to reread the 1988 book “Munich: The Eleventh Hour” by Robert Kee.
Was the betrayal of Czechoslovakia by Britain and France in September 1938 inevitable? Or should we have gone to war against Nazi Germany then rather than in September 1939?
You can read my review of Kee’s book here.
Posted in History | Comments (0)
What really happened in the American War of Independence?
January 22nd, 2019 by Roger Darlington
I enjoy reading history books and watching television programmes on history and I recently caught the first segment of BBC Four’s series “American History’s Biggest Fibs With Lucy Worsley” which dealt with the American War of Independence.
I don’t like the way Worsley feels compelled to dress up in period costume, but she has an interesting take on history which she defines as “the knitting together of rival interpretations”.
So, as regards the War of Independence, she reveals that Paul Revere never made it to Concord, the Liberty Bell wasn’t rung at the declaration of independence, and George Washington was a slave owner, and explains that the patriots could never have won without the support of the French.
I once read an excellent book on the American War of Independence, from which I learned a lot, and you can read my review here.
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How did most of the Jews of Denmark manage to escape the Holocaust?
January 21st, 2019 by Roger Darlington
In October 1943, Adolf Hitler ordered that all the Jews in Nazi-occupied Denmark be arrested and deported. Yet the Danes managed to evacuate 7,220 of the country’s 7,800 Jews plus 686 non-Jewish spouses, by sea to nearby neutral Sweden. How was this possible?
In the last couple of years, I’ve been trying to go to more theatre events in London and this intriguing question was at the heart of the play that I attended this weekend. The venue was the Park Theatre at Finsbury Park and the work was called “Rosenbaum’s Rescue”.
It is the first play written by Alexander Bodin Saphir whose mother is Danish and whose grandparents were involved in the rescue. In many ways, it is a minimalist production: only one set, all the action in the space of a few hours, and only four characters.
But the work raises some huge themes: what is the truth? how important is the truth? were the Danes that ‘good’? were the Germans that ‘evil’? how do we assess good and evil?
The play is both informative and challenging and even manages some wry humour.
You can read a little more about the play here and read a short interview with the writer here. Finally, you can learn more about this amazing historical event here.
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Who will be the Democratic candidate in the US presidential election of 2020?
January 20th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
A good American friend of mine – a Democrat – believes that Donald Trump is best opposed by Bernie Sanders in the US presidential election of 2020. I ventured to suggest to him that Trump will not be the Republican candidate and Sanders will not be the Democrat candidate. So will be standing for the two parties?
I think that the Republican candidate could well be Mike Pence following the resignation of Trump when his Vice-President automatically takes over the top job and the GOP decides to stick with the new man in the White House as its candidate.
Who will be the Democratic candidate? I really have no idea. It’s just too soon to say. But I really don’t think it will be Bernie.
Currently seven have declared that they are seeking the candidacy and at least 23 others have been mooted for the position. Who are these 30 hopefuls? Check them out here.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (0)
A review of the new political film “The Front Runner”
January 19th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
Gary Hart was a US senator for Colorado who, after a credible but failed attempt to win the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984, was the eponymous leader in the race to secure that nomination in 1988 when he was forced to withdraw because of news of an extramarital affair.
This story is told in a film directed and co-written by Canadian Jason Reitman who is known for his cinematic work on social issues and here has deliberately adopted a naturalistic style. Hugh Jackson is accomplished as the charismatic, fluent and liberal senator who, like the candidate in “The Candidate” (1972), wishes to remain authentic; J.K. Simmons as always is excellent as his campaign manager Bill Dixon; but the female roles – Vera Farmiga as the hurt wife and Sara Paxton as the girlfriend – are underwritten.
Well-made though the film is, it tells a simple tale in a conventional manner with no surprises or insights – so why was it made? It was based on a book titled “The Truth Is Out: The Week Politics Went Tabloid” and looks at how the media – especially the “Miami Herald” and the “Washington Post” – handled the scandal, so it appears to be inviting us to look back sympathetically to an earlier, simpler age when a politician like JFK could have multiple affairs and the media looked the other way.
If that was the reason for making the movie, the timing is odd when we have an occupant of the White House whose affairs (well, some of them) are very public but his political base simply does not seem to care.”The Front Runner” ends with the information that Gary Hart and his wife remain together 30 years later with the implication that, if she could forgive his misdeanour, perhaps the media and the voters should have been willing to do so too.
If – like me – you enjoy films with political themes, check out my reviews of many such movies here.
I’m waiting now for “Vice”.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
Which planet is most often closest to the Earth?
January 18th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
The closest planet to the Earth varies depending on where the various planets are in their orbits. So which planet is most often closest to the Earth?
The approximate statistics for which planet is closest to the Earth are:
Mercury: 46% of the time
Venus: 36% of the time
Mars: 18% of the time
It is a bit counterintuitive, because Venus’s orbit is closest to Earth’s orbit. Mars’s orbit is not much further. But Venus and/or Mars are often a long way away from Earth, on the opposite side of the Sun.
However, being so close to the Sun, Mercury is never as far away. At those times, Mercury is usually closer. And overall, it’s closest 46% of the time!
[My thanks to my friend Nick Hobson for drawing this information to my attention. He discovered it from this episode of the radio programme “More Or Less”.]
Posted in Science & technology | Comments (0)
My 16 predictions for the future of Brexit – how are things working out?
January 16th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
Six weeks ago, I was rash enough to make a blog posting in which I attempted to make 16 predictions for how the Brexit crisis would unfold. So, a month a half later, how are things working out?
So far, the first four of my predictions have come to pass (although not always in the sequence that I anticipated). Now let’s see how many of my other 12 predictions work out. Meanwhile, as a reminder, this is what I forecast and what has actually happened …
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- IIn the House of Commons “meaningful vote” on Theresa May’s Brexit deal, there is no majority for the deal. CORRECT – On 15 January 2019, the deal was defeated by 432 votes to 202 – the largest ever Government defeat in history.
- The Parliamentary Labour Party tables a vote of no confidence in the Government. It fails. CORRECT – On 16 January 2019, the Government survived by 325 votes to 306.
- The 1922 Committee tables a vote of no confidence in May as Conservative Party leader. It fails. CORRECT – On 12 December 2018, May won by 200 votes to 117.
- May seeks to tweak elements of the deal with the European Commission. She achieves no substantive changes. CORRECT – I thought this would happen after the “meaningful vote” but in fact it occurred before.
- A group of MPs puts forward a ‘Norway plus’ deal. The European Commission is not interested and no real progress is made.
- A group of MPs puts forward a ‘Canada plus’ deal. The European Commission is not interested and no real progress is made.
- The UK asks the other 27 Member States of the European Union for an extension to the Article 50 process to allow time for the holding a second referendum. A few extra months is granted.
- Parliament passes the necessary legislation for a second referendum. The only real debate is the choice to be presented on the ballot paper. The choice is Brexit on the terms negotiated by May or continued UK membership of the EU on current terms
- The Electoral Commission tightens up the rules on spending in the referendum.
- May campaigns hard for her deal. Corbyn campaigns much less hard for staying in the EU.
- The referendum campaign is a bitter and divisive one.
- Turnout is even higher than for the first referendum.
- The result of the second referendum is almost a mirror image of that of the first one: 53% to stay and 47% to leave.
- May resigns as leader of the Conservative Party. There is a battle for the soul of the party.
- Labour demands of the new Prime Minister that a General Election be called. There is no election.
- Corbyn resigns as leader of the Labour Party. There is a battle for the soul of the party.
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (0)
Ten of the films that I have most enjoyed in the last year
January 15th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
This week, I started a 12-week course of evening classes at the City Literary Institute in central London. The course is titled “Contemporary Cinema” and the tutor is the American John Wischmeyer. We have 25 students on the course, many of them with a deep knowledge of the movies (one woman goes to the cinema five or six times a week).
At this first session, we were invited to draw up a list of the top 10 films of 2018. I would find it really hard to select the best works of the year, but I did manage to construct a list of 10 films that I have particularly enjoyed in the past year. In alphabetical order, they are:
“Avengers: Infinity War” – my review here
“Black Panther” – my review here
“Cold War” – my review here
“First Man” – my review here
“Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again” – my review here
“Roma” – my review here
“Shoplifters” – my review here
“A Star Is Born” – my review here
“Widows” – my review here
“The Wife” – my review here
So as to demonstrate that the course would not always be about art house films, the tutor showed an extensive clip from a blockbuster success of last summer: “Mission: Impossible – Fallout” – my review here.
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A review of the recent film “The Florida Project”
January 14th, 2019 by Roger Darlington
In 1984, I took my son – then coming up to aged eight – to Disney World in Florida and we stayed in a hotel in the delightfully-named little town of Kissimmee. I would never have imagined then that 35 years later I would view a film located in such an unlikely setting as a motel in this town.
But then this movie, directed and co-written by Sean Baker and made for a mere $2M, is so different from mainstream Hollywood and shows the underbelly of the American economy where so many working class folk really struggle to get by. Shot in a naturalistic style with a cast of largely first-time actors, it is not always clear what is being said or what is happening, but this is not a work with a conventional narrative; rather it is a series of emotional incidents, concluding with an odd scene so different from the rest of the style of the work that we are told it should not be taken literally.
The physical centre of the film is the purple-painted motel The Magic Castle where the drone of passing cars is endless and the clatter of a helicopter is a regular occurrence. The emotional heart of the movie is six year old Monique/Moonee (played by Brooklynn Prince) and her young mother Halley (Lithuanian Bria Vinaite), who hustle and cheat to survive, with kind support from the hotel manager Bobby (Willem Dafoe playing against his usual type of villain or oddball). Dafoe is excellent and and received several awards for his performance, but Prince is simply outstanding for her age.
This is not a feel-good movie but ultimately it is a celebration of the human spirit.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)