Earth calling Daniel

I like Daniel Hannan. I like him for the same reason I like Peter Hitchens. He's a good writer. He's a proper ideological conservative. He isn't a drab careerist like Louise Mensch or Esther McVey or any of David Cameron's other quota-filling A-List nonentities. He has something to say, even if I rarely find myself nodding in agreement with what it is that he has to say. Sometimes, however, he can be just a little bit mad.

On Wednesday I came across a particularly pointless post of Hannan's on his Daily Telegraph blog. The subject was that old favourite of his: the European Union. Now, the blurb at the top of his blog states that Daniel "loves Europe, but believes that the European Union is making its constituent nations poorer, less democratic and less free." No problem there. While I might be a foaming-at-the-mouth Euroenthusiast, I accept that there are many people out there with legitimate concerns about the EU and that not all of those people who advocate leaving the union are extremists. The odd thing about Hannan's article was that it did not just criticise the European Union but rather bizarrely questioned what exactly constitutes the geographic entity known as Europe.

In a piece entitled 'Americans! Please stop calling us Europeans!', Hannan writes:

Britain is a common-law democracy, connected by outlook and sentiment to the wider community of English-speaking nations. We may be only 22 miles from Europe but, these days, distance hardly matters. Look at where our international telephone calls go: North America, the Caribbean, the Indian subcontinent, Australia, New Zealand. In an age of Twitter and cable television, geographical proximity is trumped by ties of language and law, habit and history, blood and speech.

Just what on earth has Hannan been smoking? Is he serious when he states that because English-speaking people in the United Kingdom are more likely to communicate on Twitter with English-speaking people in the United States or Canada, rather than with someone in Amsterdam or Berlin who's language they can't speak, that this makes us less European? Indeed, does this mean that a monolingual Twitter user in Madrid is less European because they converse more with Twitter users in Argentina and Chile than they do with ones in Rome or Warsaw? Of course not. And as for his point about cable television, I think Mr Hannan will find that DVD boxsets of everything from The Wire to Sex and the City are as popular with young people in Munich as they are with those in Manchester.

Dan Han also remarks about how he takes umbridge at Stateside conservatives who ask him what the UK intends to do about the crisis in Greece. He observes that this is akin to him asking Americans when they are "finally going to vote against Hugo Chavez." Again, this is an extremely badly made point for a man of Hannan's intellect. Given that Venezuela is neither in a political union with nor on the same continent as the United States of America, the analogy does not really have much credibility.

Another claim which he makes is that Britain's short distance from mainland Europe does not really matter when it comes to deciding his country's identity, but does he seriously believe - and can he find people who agree with him - that we should feel closer to "the Caribbean (and) the Indian subcontinent" than Paris, a city which nowadays is a mere two hour train journey from London? I find it difficult to believe that deep down he truly does believe this garbage. Perhaps he is just trying a little too hard. After reading the article again, I did get a slight feeling that the man he is trying hardest to win over to the view that Britain is not in Europe is in fact Daniel Hannan.

I have no problem with DH and others like him putting forward an argument against the European Union. However, when he starts to assert that the United Kingdom is not even a European country we have entered a whole new sanity-free realm. I am not going to be so fickle as to replicate his argument from a different perspective and attempt to make the countries in the Anglosphere which he referred to seem 'more foreign'. To be honest, there isn't anywhere in either Europe or North America these days that seems totally alien to me (and I could add Australia to that given that nearly everyone in Ireland appears to have relocated there in the past few years).

Anyhow, here's hoping that Daniel Hannan gets back to writing engaging and thought-provoking articles as soon as he can. He can do so much better than this sort of crazed Eurosceptic jibberish. But there is, however, one question I would like to ask the MEP for South East England if he ever happens to stumble upon this modest little blog: if I'm not living in Europe right now what the hell continent do I belong to?

New money for old roads

Any good idea that has been suggested in Northern Ireland over the past couple of years has generally been rejected by the powers that be on the grounds that there isn't enough money around these days to fund projects that could change our wee country for the better. "Nice idea," they say, "but how are you going to pay for it?" A valid point you might think. After all, just like the rest of Europe, aren't we are presently living in 'austerity Ulster'? Isn't now the time to batten down the hatches until the economy begins to pick up again? And, since we're doing recession clichés, aren't we all in this together?

How strange it is then to see that while there may not be enough cash floating around to do things that would improve Northern Ireland, there's still hundreds of millions of pounds available for us to throw at questionable road building projects which will have very little impact upon the vast bulk of people living here. I should make clear that not all of the more than £500 million package announced at a press conference earlier this week by the First and Deputy First Ministers should be considered a waste. £90 million for a new hospital in Omagh is a welcome move. Some more of the dosh will be set aside for refurbishment work at Altnagelvin in Derry and the Ulster Hospital in Dundonald. So, credit where it is due.

What I cannot come to terms with is the immense amount of money being wasted on roads. The gargantuan sum of £330 million is going to be spent on upgrading two sections of road on the A5 (these two sections are the stretches of road between Omagh and Ballygawley and Derry and Strabane). A further £105 million is going to be spent on improvements to the road between Belfast and Larne while a smaller amount - £57 million - will be pumped into further upgrades to the Belfast-Carrickfergus road.

Why is this irritating me so much? Well, in recent times the incredibly simplistic 'the-money-is-not-there' argument has been used to shoot down any proposals put forward by those of us who are opposed to cuts in, for example, the health service. However, when it comes to spending money on the NHS there can be few projects out there that would cost our Executive as much as building a completely new hospital in Omagh. Yet, when compared to how much it is going to cost to upgrade two sections of road west of the Bann, the new hospital in Tyrone appears to be something of a bargain.

I should at this point make clear that I am not anti-roads. I have no problem with roads being upgraded. What I do have a problem with though is the fact that in a time when money is supposedly scarce we appear to be prioritising what funds we do have on four sections of the Northern Irish road system. While it is good news that these plans will create several thousand jobs in the construction sector, you do have to wonder what the other long-term benefits of this will be.

The main one that I have heard bandied around is that it will reduce journey times. That would probably be a wonderful benefit if it wasn't for the fact that Northern Ireland is pretty small (and - unless it plans to regain Cavan, Donegal and Monaghan anytime soon - will probably remain the same size). In a place where you're rarely any more than a couple of hours from wherever it is you want to drive to, just how much time can half a billion quid reduce your journey by and, most importantly, is it worth it?

My problem with these plans lies in their utter myopia. Aside from creating some much needed short-term employment in a sector hit hard by the recession, there seems to be little in the way of worthwhile long-term benefit. If the Stormont Executive had displayed some imagination it could have invested the hundreds of millions in our public transport system. Improving and expanding our railways would create employment, it would certainly reduce journey times for travellers and few long-term benefits could be better than reducing our dependency on the car. So, why not? I'm pretty certain £500 million could deliver quite a lot in this area. While the money wouldn't completely reverse the appalling act of social vandalism caused by the recommendations of Sir Henry Benson (our own wee Dr Beeching) all those decades ago, it could at least buy us a decent rail link between Belfast and the International Airport. In fact, in some ways, you could say that we already have the basis of a rail link built and ready to go.

Although most people probably don't realise it, the Lisburn-Antrim railway line which closed in 2001 is still in operation and is maintained by Northern Ireland Railways for the purposes of training their drivers. This line actually passes the old Aldergrove station which was shut during the closures of the 1960s. What all of this means is that there already exists a railway line laid out for us that passes within a few hundred metres of Belfast International Airport - we just choose not to use it. Would it have been far too outlandish an idea to suggest that some of this week's money go to funding a project such as the development of a rail link with the International Airport? I think not, although clearly when it comes to the issue of public transport we need to be investing money on more than simply developing a rail connection with the airport at Aldergrove. But that's just one idea. I'm sure all of you reading this can think of numerous other - and better - ways to spend the money soon to be splashed out on the upgrade of the roads concerned.

When all is said and done, I can't really claim to be disappointed or let down by the present administration at Stormont. Not in the slightest. I have always expected absolutely nothing from them, least of all anything in the shape of imagination or long-term vision. If you want local representatives with those sort of qualities then it might be time you started to look outside of the Executive parties for answers. Unfortunately, the current sectarian coalition is likely to be around for another while to come, so all of us can look forward to more of the same uninspired policy announcements and dull managerial politics from the folks on the hill. And if that doesn't provide you with enough reasons to re-elect our tribal chieftains at the next Assembly election, the multi-million pound reduction of the journey time on that gruelling fourteen mile trek by car between Derry and Strabane surely will.

We're spoiled. We really are.

Jangly three-chord indie pop done properly

2012 has got off to a slow start in terms of new music (never a good thing). January, that slow month between Christmas time and the Six Nations, always requires a few good albums to get your year kicked off properly. No such luck over the past four weeks sadly. Even so, every month has at least one album worth listening to. In recent times the very mention of jangly three-chord indie pop has been enough to send me off to sleep. Done properly, however, it still has a certain appeal. And here is Brooklyn three-piece Hospitality doing jangly three-chord indie pop properly on their eponymously-titled debut album:

Unsweet enemies

I recall Angus Roxburgh, the BBC journalist and author of the 2003's Preachers of Hate: The Rise of the Far Right, saying once that if fascism ever manages to return to haunt the political landscape of Europe it will not come in the form of eccentric Second World War nostalgia freaks marching around with brown shirts and swastika armbands but instead probably make its appearance in sharp suits, ties and generally looking much like any other normal run-of-the-mill politician. Take a glance at any photograph of Marine Le Pen right now and you will wonder whether she has been listening to those comments of Mr Roxburgh.

At one stage last year the opinion polls were predicting that Madame Le Pen could potentially come top in the first round of April's French presidential election. While the possibility of that has receded somewhat, she is still riding high in the polls. One of the most recent ones which appeared in Libération earlier this month had her sitting on 19.5% - not enough to get her into the May 6 run-off but still frightening that one in five voters in the home of liberté, égalité et fraternité desire a fascist in the Palace.

While many liberal journalists like to hold their head in their hands and wonder aloud as to how we ended up at this point, in truth the answer is by no means shrouded in mystery. Mainstream French politicians have over the years contributed to the legitimisation of FN politics, and few moreso than Monsieur Sarkozy. Writing in the Guardian last year, Pierre Haski highlighted how the UMP president had made the decision long ago to combat the FN leader "on her own ground," a policy which in practice meant adopting a strategy that was the antithesis of anti-fascism.

Rather than wage a war against the ideas the FN promotes, the French President decided to borrow some of those ideas and make them his own. He introduced a ban prohibiting Muslim women from wearing garments that cover their faces. He spoke of how the "racaille" of the immigrant suburbs of Paris needed to be 'Kärcherised'. A hardline stance on immigration became a central component of the UMP agenda. In 2010 France witnessed the demolition of scores of Roma camps and the forced deportation of hundreds of Roma.

The preposterous tactic of fighting fascism with fascism has not paid off for Sarko. While his poll ratings have improved in recent months, he still trails the Socialist Party candidate François Hollande. That Marine Le Pen presently commands such a substantial level of support should not be a surprise - bring extreme right politics into the mainstream and you drag extreme right politicians there with you. Now, with the FN having performed a PR job on itself and put forward a photogenic forty-something female as its public face, we are forced to contend with the fact that the mainstream's failure to oppose racist politics is now dangerously coupled with the reality that the Front National is the main choice for French voters seeking an alternative to the PS and UMP.

Troubling though this all may well be, it remains important not to get too carried away with the threat posed. Personally I doubt the capacity of the far right, in France and elsewhere, to push itself beyond the status of a protest vote (even a sizeable protest vote). I say this for two reasons. Firstly, there is the matter of their incompetence when it comes to organisation. There seems to be a tendency on the extreme right to fracture once any sign of success occurs. Secondly, at the risk of sounding naive, I don't think the people of modern Europe would choose to go back down that fascist route. The present time - several years into the worst economic crisis in living memory - should be the perfect time if you fancy yourself as your country's latest reactionary dictator yet the political centre ground seems to have held right across Europe.

Even in France, home of our continent's most prominent reincarnation of 1930s political thuggery, the Front National does not hold a single seat in either the National Assembly or the Senate. Of France's seventy-four seats in the European Parliament, Madame Le Pen's rabble can only get their backsides on three of them. And when Le Pen the elder did actually make the second round of the French presidential election in 2002, even the hideous figure of the corrupt Jacques Chirac was able to take 82% of the vote in the run-off (incidentally, some elements on the ultra left must never be let forget nor forgiven for proposing the dangerous tactic of not voting at all against Le Pen).

Back at the end of 2010, following the success of the Sweden Democrats in the general election in their country, I wrote a piece on this site where I stated that the real threat from the right in Europe came not from the FN or the BNP, but from the Berlusconis and the Camerons and the Sarkozys - those figures on the 'respectable' right who would unashamedly take on some of the policies of the extreme right in order to stem their growth. One might argue that in desperate times this could count as the lesser of two evils, but does the deported member of the Roma community care whether they were dumped out of France by a UMP or an FN administration? No. And therein lies the danger.

Yes, the success of the Front National is an embarrassment for the majority of French citizens. Yes, we on the left would obviously prefer to see the FN wiped off the face of the French political map. But do I think in the short, medium or long term this party could genuinely take power in France? No. Do I think that there is a single far right party in Europe capable of taking power? No. The real threat exists elsewhere.

The spectre haunting the continent right now is the spectre of an increasingly populist mainstream centre-right and it is they that hold state power in the majority of European countries. Whether it is Cameron's mix of anti-EU posturing abroad and massive cuts at home, Sarkozy's attempts to steal the FN's clothes by doing his best impression of Le Pen or Mario Monti's bizarre dictatorship of the 'experts' in Italy, the centre-right is doing damage while the far right merely talks about what damage it would like to do.

At this point we arrive at the big problem for those of us in my camp: has Europe's left got a strategy for turning the rising right-wing tide? Mobilising against the pantomime villains of 'the fash' will never be a problem for socialists in any country; getting the centre-right out of power will be a much tougher job. If there is a strategy then I have certainly not heard it yet. Perhaps they are hiding it for the right moment. Maybe they are still in the process of drawing one up. Possibly, and sadly I suspect this might be the right answer, there isn't actually any strategy to speak of whatsoever. Now has to be the time for Europe's left to come together, rediscover their spirit of internationalism and put forward a coherent social democratic vision for the EU. Are they capable of such a grand masterplan? Time will tell. For now, kicking Sarkozy's backside out of the Élysée Palace in May would be a positive start to the fightback.

Defending the indefensible with the absurd

"Despite its repressive character, the Gadaffi regime shared much of Libya's oil wealth with the mass of the people, providing some of the best health, education and utility services in Africa and the Middle East."

Morning Star
August 22nd 2011


"You can say what you want about Gaddafi," remarked a work colleague a few days ago, "but at least he was able to give his people free medical care and free education. America can't do that." My fellow worker, who we shall for the sake of argument call 'Michael', had surprised me. He had surprised me not because he had made a clever observation about Gaddafi's regime that I had somehow failed to take into account, but rather the surprise lay in the fact that he was someone who I thought would have known better. Clearly not.

But with the comment from 'Michael' came a strange sense of déjà vu. This was not the first time I had heard this little line about health and education used in relation to totalitarianism. Yes, I had heard it said about the Gaddafi regime in the Morning Star a few months previously but it goes back way before that. In his amusing autobiography Reasons to be Cheerful, Mark Steel tells an anecdote from the eighties about how a Communist Party member in Britain once told him of how Russian hospitals had performed a new pioneering operation to remove cataracts. All well and good said Steel, but it didn't exactly make up for the slaughter of Hungarians in 1956, did it?

My first recollection of this defence of ugliness came when a secondary school teacher was speaking about the USSR (yeah, fair enough, the Soviet system was a nasty piece of work but the sick weren't charged and the kiddies were educated... or something like that). It came up again during the NATO campaign in Kosovo in 1999 when a crusty old Stalinist remarked to me that for all Milosevic's failings he did at least operate Europe's only "anti-market economy" (really?) as well as provide his people with, you guessed it, free health and education.

When Iraq's Ba'athist dictatorship was toppled four years later the free-health-and-education guff seemed to go into overdrive. Even though I was an opponent of the campaign to oust Saddam and his family back in 2003, I did cringe when fellow anti-war comrades would seem to have to go one step further and highlight the benefits of the Ba'athist regime, like the nice if naive Canadian lady who pointed out to me that the country prior to the invasion had some wonderful museums and art galleries which were open free to the people. The citizens of Halabja were just so ungrateful, weren't they?

There is a far right equivalent to all of this. You will be familiar I'm sure with the man who claims that 'Hitler had some good ideas' and that the Führer did well to create full employment in Germany prior to the war, or perhaps you will be acquainted with the individual who notes how Mussolini made the Italian trains run on time. But on the left the obsession does seem to be with the free health and education that despots sometimes operate alongside concentration camps and mass graves. It can in an odd way be darkly funny, though the humour wears off slightly when you hear a member of the crackpot CPGB (M-L) praise the social services currently offered in North Korea.

I wonder do these people actually check to see if the dictatorships they so happily rush to holler the benefits of even possess these things. Did Saddam really allow free entry to art galleries in Baghdad? Does Harpal Brar have an in-depth knowledge of Pyongyang's school system? Do such people even care? Of course not. The point of these protestations is less a defence of sickening totalitarian governments and more a bizarre unwillingness to accept that the United States and it's allies in the democratic world are, finally, in the right. When all situations are analysed from the point of what you are against rather than what you stand for, you will inevitably find yourself in bed with all sorts of strange creatures.

Nevertheless, it is still encouraging to see at least one organisation on the Marxist left in Britain still prepared to offer no defence of the Gaddafi era whatsoever and welcome it's total destruction. As the tiny AWL put it in their newspaper:

If working-class organisation is our starting point, then the fundamental question must be whether that organisation is more or less possible, easier or harder, without the crushing, murderous Qaddafi regime. The answer is that it is infinitely more possible. And that alone is cause for celebration and hope.

Celebration and hope. I don't normally do positive endings, but I'll make an exception this one time.