A review of the novel “Before I Go To Sleep”
July 29th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
I saw the film adaptation and found it intriguing and so I’ve now read the novel which is a real page-turner. You can read my review here.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
A review of the film “The Hundred-Foot Journey”
July 29th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
If the only movies you enjoy are action-packed, stunt-filled blockbusters, look away now. If on the other hand, you are open to a quiet and humorous look at rivalry between French and Indian eating establishments, this is a film worth watching on television. You can read my review here.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
When President Barack Obama completes his second term, what will he do with the rest of his life?
July 28th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
Barack Obama will step down from the US presidency in January 2017. At that point, he still only be 55. So what is going to do?
I suspect – and hope – that he eschew the opportunities to make lots of money from private sector appointments and that instead he will return to being an academic. But I have a dream …
Hillary Clinton becomes the next presidency and, during her term of office, has the opportunity to appoint a judge to the Supreme Court. She appoints Obama. Remember where you heard it first …
Is this possible, you ask? There are no formal qualifications for membership of the Supreme Court, but Obama has all the legal knowledge necessary for the post. And there is a little-known precedent …
William Howard Taft (1857-1930) was the 27th President of the United States (1909-1913) and later the 10th Chief Justice of the United States (1921-1930). He is the only person to have served in both of these offices.
You can read more about William Howard Taft here.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (0)
Why is opinion polling becoming harder and less reliable?
July 27th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
All the pollsters failed to forecast accurately the result of the British General Election in May 2015. We are still awaiting the outcome of an inquiry by the British Polling Council to determine what went wrong and how it can be fixed.
Most of my work as a consumer advocate involves working with regulators and companies who are constantly surveying the views of customers, consumers, users, citizens (the terminology varies from sector to sector and survey to survey). The mantra of all government departments and local authorities is that there should be more consumer and citizen engagement.
But if more and more polling is being done of ever busier people in a changing context of technology and life style, how reliable are these polls and surveys? This important question is discussion in this short article.
Posted in Consumer matters, Miscellaneous, Social policy | Comments (1)
John F Kennedy – the ‘what if?’ American president
July 26th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
Last summer, I was at the City Lit in London to attend a course on post-war American presidents. I wrote blog postings on each of the presidents we discussed:
- Lyndon B Johnson – my blog posting here
- Richard M Nixon – my blog posting here
- Gerald Ford – my blog posting here
- Jimmy Carter – my blog posting here
- Ronald Reagan – my blog posting here
- George H W Bush – my blog posting here
- Bill Clinton – my blog posting here
This week, I was back at the City Lit for a lecture on a president that I missed in last year’s course: the one before Johnson, the one who was assassinated in office, the charismatic John F Kennedy. The lecture was given by Mark Malcomson who is in fact the college’s principal. He is incredibly knowledgeable about American politics and a very fluent presenter.
JFK was the third of nine children – the older two died in aircraft incidents – and he suffered from ill-health all his life (especially back problems) so, in some respects, he was a very unlikely president. In 1946, he was elected to the House of Representatives as a Democrat in South Boston in a year when there was a Republican landslide nationally. Similarly, in 1952, he was elected to the Senate for Massachusetts in spite of another Republication landslide nationally. His service in Congress was undistinguished.
But JFK’s election as president in 1960 was truly historic. At the age of 43, he was the youngest elected president in US history ((Teddy Roosevelt was a year younger when became president following an assassination). As a Catholic, he was the first (and so far the only) non-Protestant to become president. His victory was achieved by a mere 0.3% of the popular vote (although he had a easy majority in the Electoral College).
JFK’s presidency started disastrously just three months into his term with the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion of Castro’s Cuba, but Kennedy accepted responsibility for the operation planned by the previous administration. The Cuban missile crisis of October 1962 – the ‘Thirteen Days’ – was his finest moment, but his speech in Berlin (following the construction of the wall) in June 1963 further enhanced his reputation. Yet he did little to advance the civil rights agenda and managed no significant legislative achievements.
The assassination of John Kennedy in Dallas on 22 November 1963 is seared on the memory of just about everyone alive at the time ( I was 15 and remember it well). He would certainly have won the presidential election of 1964, so inevitably his death has constantly invited speculation of what might have happened had he not been assassinated.
Our lecturer Mark Malcomson concluded his presentation by running through some of the possible scenarios. Johnson only became president because of JFK’s death; Nixon became president because Johnson did not run for a second term; Ford only became president because of Nixon’s resignation … so, had JFK lived, subsequent presidencies would probably have been very different. One fanciful scenario sees John Kennedy serving two terms, followed Robert Kennedy doing his two terms, and then Ted Kennedy winning his two terms to make 24 years of Kennedys in the White House.
On the basis of less fanciful speculation, we might have seen no substantial increase in US involvement in Vietnam and a de-escalation of the Cold War. On the other hand, we might have seen no real progress on the civil rights front and certainly no Great Society (Johnson’s initiative) which would probably have led to earlier and worse violence from the black communities.
If JFK had continued in office for another five years, would the media have exposed his serious ill-health and/or his rampant adultery? And, even if they had not, would Addison’s disease have killed him in office?
You can read more about John Kennedy here.
Posted in Environment, History | Comments (1)
Why do bad things happen? – a review of “The Magic Of Reality”
July 25th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
Popular science books and programmes have become, well, popular because we all want to understand our world and our universe.
Richard Dawkins in a master in explaining complicated science in understandable language and I’ve just finished reading his 2011 book “The Magic Of Reality”. You can read my review here.
Posted in Science & technology | Comments (0)
My 20th short story: “It isn’t over …”
July 24th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
One of my favourite sayings is: “It isn’t over till it’s over … and then it isn’t over”. What do I mean?
Well, I illustrated the notion in this short story that I wrote five years ago.
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
The cost of ending slavery in the British Empire
July 23rd, 2015 by Roger Darlington
BBC television has just broadcast two remarkable programme entitled “Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners”. The writer and presenter is David Olusoga, a half British, half Nigerian academic.
The programmes explain how in 1834 slavery was officially abolished by the British parliament but the slave owners were handsomely compensated. The Slavery Compensation Commission paid out a total sum equivalent to £17 bullion in today’s money to some 46,000 claimants stretching across the British Empire. Not a penny, of course, went to the 800,000 African slaves.
The programmes bring out the horror of the slave trade and follow how the compensation money was used. It is an account that is unsettling and upsetting but important to know.
Posted in History | Comments (0)
U.S. presidential election (9): now a total of 21 politicians declared as candidate for their party’s nomination
July 22nd, 2015 by Roger Darlington
On the day that I did a posting explaining that there are now 20 candidates seeking to win the US presidency next year, yet another candidate declared. He is John Kasich, the Republican governor of Ohio.
This makes the Republican field especially crowded with no less than 15 bidders for their party’s nomination. Probabaly all the potential candidates in both parties have now declared. The primaries will now progressively reduce the field.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (0)
U.S. presidential election (8): no less than 20 politicians now declared as candidate for their party’s nomination
July 21st, 2015 by Roger Darlington
My last posting on the American presidential election was a month ago when I noted that the number of candidates in the two parties had risen to 15. That number is now an incredible 20 – five Democrats and 15 Republicans. You can see the full list here.
On the Democratic side, all the excitement is coming from the better than expected performance of Bernie Sanders, but nobody expects him to win the party nomination. Hillary Clinton is widely expected to do that. Meanwhile my American friend, a strong supporter of Sanders, has written about the need to turn the presidential campaign into a sustained mass movement. You can read his piece here.
On the Republican side, the most recent development was the ridiculous assertion from Donald Trump – who managed to evade the Vietnam draft – that former presidential Republican candidate John McCain was not a war hero. But again nobody expects Trump to win his party’s nomination. Currently there is no clear runner but Jeb Bush and Scott Walker are expected to do well.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (1)