Has anyone actually read the Chilcot Report?
July 8th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
The Chilcot Report on the invasion of Iraq consists of 12 volumes adding up to some 2.6 million words. Even the Executive Summary runs to 145 pages.
According to an item in the “Guardian” newspaper, on average people read about 250 words a minute so, on that estimate, it would take 10,400 minutes or about 173 hours to read the whole of the Chilcot Report.
Assuming you spent eight hours on it every day and took weekends off, that makes digesting the whole report about a month’s full-time work.
I repeat: has anyone actually read the Chilcot Report?
Posted in British current affairs, World current affairs | Comments (0)
A review of the action comedy “Central Intelligence”
July 7th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
Hard day at the office? Want to unwind and laugh a bit? You could do worse than view this new release which pairs The Rock with The Mouth. Check out my review here.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
What Alastair Campbell has to say about the Chilcot Inquiry on the Iraq War
July 7th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
If ever the word tragedy was appropriate, it applies in spades to the whole experience of the Iraq War. It is too simple to view the actions of British politicians and officials – especially Tony Blair – as the acts of evil men. Enormous mistakes were made but essentially they were made by people who had good intentions – hence the tragedy. I was particularly struck by this blog posting from Blair’s communications chief at the time, Alastair Campbell. In part, he states:
“I was one of the few people who saw the process of his making the decision close up, virtually round the clock, around the world. Far from seeing someone hellbent on war, I saw someone doing all he could to avoid it. Far from seeing someone undermine the UN, I saw him trying his hardest to make it work. Far from seeing someone cavalier about the consequences of war, I saw someone who agonised about them, and I know he still does, as do all who were there, part of his team.
He was of course bombarded by views, from friend and foe. He was acutely aware of protest. He was aware that much could go wrong. He was aware lives would be lost. He was conscious of the possibility of damage to our relationship with the US if we didn’t go with them, and damage to the relationship with other allies if we did.
But here is the difference between him and other ministers and MPs, him and advisors, him and commentators, him and the public who three times elected him, including after the fall of Saddam. He had to decide. One way or the other. With the US or not. Topple Saddam or leave him. Knowing that either way there were consequences which were hard to foresee.”
Posted in British current affairs, World current affairs | Comments (0)
What is blue, green and grey water?
July 6th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
As part of my work as a consumer advocate, for over four years now I’ve been active in the water sector chairing a Customer Challenge Group for South East Water. So I’ve been attending lots of discussions and events about water and trying to keep up with all the acronyms and terminology in the sector.
I was thrown when I first heard references to blue, green and grey water. What on earth is this all about, I thought – and you might too.
The blue water refers to freshwater.
The green water refers to water stored in soil.
The grey water is polluted water.
I understand that globally there is enough freshwater on our planet to support even 10 billion people (not if we all live like in the USA), but grey water can dangerously pollute blue and green water.
In an online discussion of the different types of water, I found this analysis:
“Rain fed agriculture covers 80% of the world’s cultivated land, and is responsible for about 60% of crop production. In rain fed agriculture the soil stores the rain and releases it slowly to the plants. This rainwater used in agriculture is part of what is called ‘green water’ and is a characteristic of the land on which it falls. It is usually not subject to competition from other sectors.
Yields in rain fed agriculture are still far from their potential. In 2005, cereal yields were about 1.1.5 tonnes per hectare in Sub-Saharan Africa, compared with 5 tonnes per hectare in Europe. ‘Green water’ or rain fed agriculture has an important role to play in sustaining populations and securing future food supplies.
By contrast, in irrigation, water is extracted from rivers, lakes and aquifers (which is referred to as ‘blue water’). This ‘blue water’ is applied on land, where most of is consumed by evapo transportation. Irrigation competes with other sectors (including the environment) for ‘blue water.’ Today irrigated agriculture covers about 20% of cultivated land and accounts for 40% of global food production. ’Grey water’ is polluted or waste water, which can be recycled and purified. Grey water will play an important role in securing future global water supplies.”
So, now you know …
Posted in Environment | Comments (0)
Was Marx actually a Marxist?
July 5th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
I’ve just watched a recording of the BBC 4 profile of Karl Marx, the first programme in a new short series of great thinkers presented by British historian Bettany Hughes.
I’ve always recoiled from most of the ideas in Marxism and, when I read a biography of Marx, I rather recoiled from the man himself. In particular, I felt that this was not a man who lived life according to my own principles of decency and kindness.
You can read my review of this biography here.
Posted in History | Comments (0)
American independence – then and now
July 4th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
On 4 July 1776, the American Declaration of Independence was announced. On this anniversary day, I send good wishes to all my American friends both in the USA and elsewhere.
So, 240 years on, how is the Republic doing? Even many Americans struggle to comprehend how the American constitution and American politics are working out.
So I offer my short guide to the American political system.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (0)
The enduring appeal of the rom-com movie
July 3rd, 2016 by Roger Darlington
I’m a big movie fan and an incurable romantic so I enjoy a good romantic comedy and this weekend I attended a course on the history of rom-coms held at the City Literary Institute in London. The lecturer was male (Guy Meredith) but, except for me, all the eight students were female.
Our lecturer told us that all stories have four basic elements: world, characters, tone, and plot. All rom-coms have essentially the same plot: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy wins girl back (or, of course, a reversal of these gender roles). So, to make a rom-com different, the writer and director need to manipulate the other three story elements: world, character, tone.
At the opening of the course, each of us was invited to name our favourite rom-com and a recent one that we have seen. I offered “When Harry Met Sally …” [my review here] and “The Meddler” [my review here] respectively.
During the one-day course, we were shown clips from 11 films – not all of which I would regard as rom-coms: “The General”, “It Happened One Night”, “Once” [my review here], “About A Boy” [my review here], “The Third Man”, “Tootsie”, “Fever Pitch” [my review here], “Knocked Up” [my review here], “Music & Lyrics” [my review here], one segment of “Paris Je T’aime”, and “Sideways” [my review here].
Which is your favourite rom-com?
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
A review of the film “Suite Francaise”
July 2nd, 2016 by Roger Darlington
This wartime love story has unusual origins and unconventional characterisations, so it is worth looking up. I’ve reviewed it here.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
Why is there so much irrational opposition to genetically modified food?
July 2nd, 2016 by Roger Darlington
“The United Nations Food & Agriculture Program has noted that global production of food, feed and fiber will need approximately to double by 2050 to meet the demands of a growing global population. Organizations opposed to modern plant breeding, with Greenpeace at their lead, have repeatedly denied these facts and opposed biotechnological innovations in agriculture. They have misrepresented their risks, benefits, and impacts, and supported the criminal destruction of approved field trials and research projects.
We urge Greenpeace and its supporters to re-examine the experience of farmers and consumers worldwide with crops and foods improved through biotechnology, recognize the findings of authoritative scientific bodies and regulatory agencies, and abandon their campaign against “GMOs” in general and Golden Rice in particular.”
This is the opening to a short, but powerful, letter signed by 110 Nobel Prize-winning scientists, almost all of whom earned their prizes in the fields of physics, chemistry or medicine.
In 2014, the Pew Research Center found an enormous gap between the public and scientists on this issue. Just 37 per cent of adults in the United States said genetically modified foods were safe to eat, while 88 per cent of scientists connected to the American Association for the Advancement of Science said the same.
It is time to look at the science and listen to reason. The world’s poor need GM foods.
Posted in Environment | Comments (0)
Jeremy Corbyn will soon be gone – and then …
June 30th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
This has been the most tumultuous week in British politics in my lifetime. On a large turnout but by a small margin, the electorate voted for Britain to leave the European Union. I still can’t quite believe that this will happen but I have no idea how it will not.
Meanwhile political careers are falling like dead bodies. David Cameron expected to remain Prime Minister and has had to announce his resignation. Boris Johnson expected to become Prime Minister and will not even be a candidate for the Conservative Party leadership; and then there is Jeremy Corbyn …
I have never been a Corbyn supporter. As a Labour Party member, he was the bottom of the four candidates when I voted in the leadership election last summer. I expected him to be a disaster and so it has proved. He is not primarily to blame for the terrible Brexit decision (that would be Cameron) , but the verdict by Alan Johnson – my former boss at the CWU – is just the latest, if perhaps the most serious, of the many, many justifiable charges against him.
Seven months ago, I did a blog posting about Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party entitled “The growing despair of a Labour loyalist”. It attracted a number of comments and, in response to one, I in turn commented:
“Corbyn was elected on the first ballot in a large turn out in a democratic party election. Labour MPs cannot – and dare not – ignore this mandate.
Whatever i think about Corbyn’s politics and policies, I think that he is an honourable man and that sooner or later he will realise that he is not the person to lead the Labour Party to victory and do the honourable thing.
When Corbyn was first elected, I thought that this process would take two or even three years before sanity prevailed. But, every week now, I fear that there is no way we can wait that long or that events will take that long.”
This week, over 60 Labour MPs have resigned from the Front Bench, but still Corbyn remains leader. The Parliamentary Labour Party carried a vote of no confidence in him by 172 votes to 40, but Corbyn is still there. Now Angela Eagle is on the verge of mounting a leadership challenge – and still he is there.
But I remain confident that my assessment of seven months ago holds true. He will step down – and soon. Then the real work of rebuilding the credibility of the Labour Party begins.
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (6)