Blowing in the wind

This week marked the 80^th anniversary of the start of the second world war.  Commemorations took place in Poland and several world leaders attended, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe, Belgian Prime Minister and President-elect of the European Council, Charles Michel, as well as leaders from Croatia, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Slovakia, Ukraine and Hungary.  Perhaps understandably, given the issues that he is failing to contend with at home, Boris Johnson did not represent Britain, appointing in his place, the Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab.

Also missing was Donald Trump; who sent Vice President, Mike Pence as his delegate.  Mr Trump recognised that his domestic priorities should rise to the top of his agenda, in particular, the meetings with his Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) prior to the arrival in the US of Hurricane Dorian, which at the time, was making landfall in the Bahamas where it has caused unprecedented damage and, to date, has cost the lives of 30 people, with hundreds more still missing.

Such was the importance of the meetings to Trump that he skipped out of Camp David (twice) for quick rounds of golf at the Trump National Golf Club, Washington, DC.  We know it was quick because he tweeted as such in an insult directed at Sadique Kahn (sic)[1], London’s Mayor, who dared to criticise his failure to focus fully on Dorian.  In the same Twitter tirade, he also took the opportunity to further criticise Barack Obama’s golfing expeditions, saying, “Me, I run through one of my courses (very inexpensive). President Obama would fly to Hawaii.” 

Really?

According to the website www.trumpgolfcount.com, the sole purpose of which appears to be the tracking of President Trump’s golf excursions, he has cost the US tax-payer approximately $109,000,000 for the 213 visits to golf clubs since his incumbency began.  In fairness, he may only have played golf on 149 of those occasions, so we shouldn’t be too critical, even Presidents need exercise, but according to Forbes magazine, he’s on track to cost the American public over $340 million by the end of his presidency – always assuming he’s not re-elected.  By contrast, in his eight years in office, Obama played 333 rounds.  Trump’s trajectory is between 600 and 800. 

Speaking of trajectories, it appears that Mr Trump might not have been paying too much attention to the FEMA briefing when he wasn’t golfing.  Twice in separate video briefings and once on Twitter he announced that Hurricane Dorian would be hitting Alabama.  Geography is clearly not a strong point, forecasts for the storm’s course show it moving from the Bahamas to the Florida panhandle, before tracing a course that will take it up the Eastern seaboard past Georgia and the Carolinas.  The National Weather Service (NWS) quickly tweeted a retraction.

That was on Sunday, since then Trump has taken not only to Twitter, to suggest there was substance to his messaging, but also gone to the extent of a press briefing that shows him holding a map showing the hurricane’s path.  Quite extraordinarily, the map was doctored with a black Sharpie to circle southern Alabama.  If it wasn’t so pathetic, it would be funny.  What it demonstrates is that Donald Trump is utterly unable to admit an error and he would rather spin a web of falsehoods to disprove his mistake, even if, as some commentators are suggesting, a Federal offence may have occurred by altering Hurricane Dorian's path to validate his claim.  It represents an astonishing piece of disinformation from a man who has the thinnest, thick-skin of any known human.  One wonders how many people in Alabama began making preparations to evacuate. 

Trump’s concern for Hurricane Dorian is rightly placed.  It is a category 5 storm, the highest rating on the Saffir-Simpson scale with sustained winds greater than 157 mph.  His press conference on the matter led him to state that “a Category 5 is something that I don’t know that I’ve ever even heard the term, other than I know it’s there”.  Odd really, it’s the fourth category 5 storm to hit the United States during his presidency after hurricanes Irma (2017), Maria (2017) and Michael (2018).  The clever people at Now This have compiled a much better case for demonstrating his failing memory on the subject.  They’ve also done an excellent job of demonstrating Trump’s limited use of language when describing catastrophic events, “This is a tough hurricane, one of the wettest we’ve ever seen from the standpoint of water” is just one of the pearls he delivered, there are plenty more asinine comments that undermine his boasts of a high IQ.

As a further demonstration of his ineptitude, the Axios website alleges that in a White House briefing on hurricanes, the president suggested detonating a nuclear bomb in the eye of the storm to arrest its progress.  When the naysayers pointed out that dropping a device, that releases radioactive material, into the world’s most effective dispersal system, might not be his cleverest suggestion, Trump resorted to his modus operandi for denial by stating on Twitter that, “The story [was] … Just more FAKE NEWS!”.  I would like to think that, on this occasion, even he couldn’t be as profoundly stupid as the report suggested and that he has been the victim of a nasty sleight.  Perhaps if he had a reputation for honesty and integrity, I’d be prepared to accept his denial.

Reflecting on my opening point, his behaviour displays enormous contempt for the victims of World War II by fobbing-off his Polish hosts with excuses that will enable him to play golf, but equally, to the American people, by being unable to focus on a potential natural disaster that has caused widespread destruction and heart-breaking loss of life in the Bahamas.

People’s lives matter. 

I don’t begrudge his desire to play a round of golf, but the timing is wholly inappropriate in the face of such a catastrophe.  His ineptitude and disinterest are a danger to his nation.  When Puerto Rico, a US territory, was hit in 2017 by Maria, one of his ‘forgotten’ hurricanes, Donald Trump’s response was glacially slow and totally inadequate.  One of the most profound images of that time showed him contemptuously throwing rolls of kitchen paper out to the Puerto Ricans before him who may have hoped for something a little more useful for managing the disaster, such as the resources to restore power, water and sanitation, rather than a roll of ultra absorbant towel.  Congress authorised $20 billion of recovery funds for national disasters, a fraction of which has been released to Puerto Rico and Trump has now ordered $3.6 billion of those funds, and others allocated to military projects, to be diverted to the building of his wall on the Mexican border.  Worse still, he has tied the further release of funds to efforts to reform the government in Puerto Rico and crackdown on corruption – he doesn’t care for the Puerto Rican people, he’s holding them hostage.

It is fortunate that the agencies within the United States charged with managing preparedness and relief take their responsibility more seriously and exercise more competence, but, as Puerto Rico has demonstrated, they need resources to be effective.  Trump’s lack of understanding, awareness and his disregard for the well-being of others hampers their efforts.  So too does the management of his image, which rather than doing anything to restore his credibility, serves only to highlight that the US people are led by a man who is so self-centred that he cares not a jot for the country that he wishes to make great again.

Twitter: @GOMinTraining
Copyright © Craig Brown, 2019
6 September 2019

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[1] He later deleted the original tweet and repeated the insults with the correct spelling of Sadiq Khan, but only once – the second mention of ‘Kahn’ followed a few lines later.

Tapping-in to ignorance

The weather on Bank Holiday Monday was glorious.  With little planned for the day, the WhatsApp message from a friend proposing a cycle ride was a welcome suggestion.  Before you conjure the image of a wholesome activity to improve my fitness, allow me to disabuse you.  The bike was merely the chosen mode of transport to the pub of our choice for a splendid lunch in its beer garden.

It was a busy day and the popularity of the place meant that I was at the bar, waiting to be served, for quite some time.  Standing alone, I confess to eavesdropping on the conversation of three locals perched on stools.  Whilst I was tempted, I resisted contributing to their conversation for three primary reasons: 1) I hadn’t been invited, 2) I might have said something to offend, and 3) I’d probably have been punched.  I acknowledge the cowardice in failing to express my opinion; I’m not terribly brave when it comes to confrontation, and I fancied a quiet beer.

In this tumultuous political climate, it was unsurprising that they were talking about Brexit.  Given their chat, I think I can safely assume that they were squarely in the ‘Leave’ camp.  Their conversation revolved around the benefits to Britain that we’ll experience on departure from the EU.  A common tactic for those of us against leaving is to ask those in favour to list the benefits of Brexit and sit back smugly.  ‘Taking back control’ and ‘reclaiming our sovereignty’ are typically tossed back at that point, but the PM’s proroguing of parliament has pulled the proverbial rug from underneath that one.  On Monday, that abuse of our democracy was still a few days away.  However, I suspected that I was about to hear some somewhat different arguments from the stooges before me.  I was not wrong.

I learnt a few surprising ‘facts’, spoken with such a degree of conviction that, to the uninformed, they would appear indisputable.  Did you know, for instance, that the EU prevents the sale of British lamb in Britain?  Out of curiosity, I’ve checked the websites of Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons, ASDA, and Waitrose.  Guess what?  The Union flag was splattered across their lamb offerings.  I presume we’re still okay, unless I missed a Welsh independence vote and they haven’t updated the image.

I contemplated whether those foreign infiltrators, Aldi and Lidl, might be parochial in their provision of lamb.  Not a bit.  In fact, Lidl usefully pointed out the seasonality of its lamb availability stating, “[our lamb] is seasonally sourced from both the UK and New Zealand, with New Zealand lamb available January to June and British lamb available from July to December.”  In fairness, the woman bemoaning the restriction on British lamb sales also complained that we “had to have New Zealand lamb”.  I mused that a debate on the respective breeding seasons in the northern and southern hemispheres might be a little too deep for someone that has such a misaligned view of reality.

One of the chaps spoke about fishing, delighting that, on 1 November, British waters can be freely plundered by our fisherman.  Whilst unfettered access to British waters may follow a release from negotiated fishing quotas (which may not be the case under a ‘no-deal’ Brexit), British fishermen could find selling their hauls a little more difficult.  Today we can trade tariff-free with our European partners.  If, as our disingenuous Prime Minister would have you believe, things will be much better for Britain once we’re out from under the shackles of the EU, consider that any attempt to sell cod to the EU will attract an immediate 12% tariff.  Let us not forget that fish is wildly available beyond Britain’s coastal waters.  The Europeans will be able to get their tariff-free cod from a considerable number of other fisheries within the EEA. 

A parliamentary research briefing highlights that 70% of the UK’s £1.3 billion of fish exports go to the EU.  That’s £910 million of fish that’s going to cost European buyers £1.02 billion after 31 October 2019[1].  I suspect they’d rather buy from their European brethren than spend an additional £110 million on their fish and chips.  Notwithstanding, if they did take our fish, it’s perishable – it might honk a bit after the predicted delays brought about by greater customs controls.

The third sage was also willing to contribute his mind-numbingly ill-informed wisdom.  Clapping his hands together and rubbing them gleefully, he opined that we’ll all enjoy cheaper holidays.  He didn’t provide any substantiation for this claim, but one should note that on the day of voting in the EU referendum, a pound would buy you a little over €1.30.  When the result was announced on 24 June 2016, the pound lost 5.8% of its value to €1.22.  Oh, how I yearn for those days!  A pound at the current exchange rate will yield you just €1.0954[2]. 

If we allow only for exchange rate differences, a stein of beer in Munich’s Hofbrauhaus, a plate of Jamón ibérico from La Boqueria in Barcelona or a croissant from a Parisian Patisserie is going to cost us Brits nearly 19% more than it did before we voted.  One might argue that our little-Englander would rather not take his holidays in Europe, after all, he voted to leave.  But the damage to our exchange rate isn’t just limited to the Euro.  Since the referendum, the value of the pound has fallen more than 20% against 44 currencies and by between 10% and 20% against a further 69.  Perhaps I’m doing him a disservice.  Maybe he’s considering a trip to North Korea or Sudan.  Things must be cheap there; the pound is up over 80% against their currencies for the same period – I must mention that to Mrs GOM when we plan our next holiday.

Thankfully, I got served before I had to listen to more.  I felt for the barman who couldn’t escape their nonsense.  However, it did make me reflect on where they get their information.  Either, they make it up (which is not entirely implausible) or they are consuming falsehoods and regurgitating them as fact.  One must wonder where the stories come from and why they are so readily digested.  It serves to illustrate that our skewed media and dishonest politicians are feeding willing subjects with toxic stories that go unchallenged and are readily believed. 

The charlatans, racists and bigots that have led us to Brexit have been more sophisticated than those that wish to remain.  They’ve studied their Sun Tzu and Niccolò Machiavelli more closely; they’ve adopted modern technology to fuel the fears and appeal to the prejudices of the impressionable; and they’ve completely outwitted their opponents.  Those that have campaigned against them have failed to exploit new and traditional media channels – one might argue that’s because they’ve chosen to solicit votes lawfully.  How silly of them.

Our country is divided, and we are led by a Pied Piper of a Prime Minister who is willing to let us drown for his aggrandisement.  He, and others of his ilk, have used nefarious techniques to influence a sufficient proportion (27%) of the UK population to take all 65 million of us, lemming-like, to a cliff[3].  I fear, we’re about to step off, but when we do, I suspect a good proportion of those going over the edge will believe that there will be a giant inflatable filled with the dreamy hot air of our bloviating politicians that will cushion the fall.

Twitter: @GOMinTraining
Copyright © Craig Brown, 2019
30 August 2019

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[1] Tariffs vary by species but, in the interests of simplicity, indulge me.  A simplified table of tariffs can be found here.

[2] Source: www.xe.com.  Exchange rates prior to 29 August are mid-market rates on the dates recorded.  Rates for 29 August 2019 taken at 13:22 UTC

[3] … and before you say it, I know lemmings don’t do that.

Say it today

On Wednesday, we learnt the terrible news that the father of a friend of ours had died unexpectedly.  He and his family had gathered in the UK to celebrate his 75^th birthday.  Instead of their planned celebrations, they are mourning his loss.

His passing speaks of the fragility of the human condition.  We are time-limited; we don’t know how long we have.  Ill health can point to the end of our days, as it did for my mother and sister, who both developed cancer at an early age; we could see them diminish before us and we knew that they had little time left.

However, when sudden death presents itself, as it did with my father, who died when I was 13, the event is, arguably, more seismic.  There is no time to prepare, acceptance is harder and, whilst the sense of loss is the same, the feeling of being cheated is far greater.

Sudden deaths happen and, by default, we lack preparedness.  When it occurs, there is little that we can do.  The shock is often acute, even now, 36 years on from the day my father died, I have the clearest of memories of my mother’s words as she sat on the tailgate of an ambulance, hugging me.  “He’s gone,” she said.
An hour before, I’d been watching him play football.

When someone dies suddenly, we may miss the opportunity to share, to love, to reconcile; the chance to say whatever it is that we need to say to each other.  That can lead to feelings of guilt that may make the loss a more difficult and painful experience.  When that happens, we must hope that, in time, the memory of our loved one will bring a smile to our face rather than tears to our eyes.

I’m blessed, to have people around me who I love.  Sometimes, though, that wonderful truth is neglected.  So, if you’ll forgive me, I’ll end this week’s passage here.  I’m not planning to leave this life anytime soon, but I’m going to make a small, simple preparation, just in case.  I urge you to pop down your phone and do the same.

I’m off to tell my family I love them.  I know they know it, but, sometimes, it’s best to hear it from me.

Twitter: @GOMinTraining
Copyright © Craig Brown, 2019
23 August 2019

Postscript:

When my mother died in 2004, I wrote a memoir to help me with my grief.  It's available in paperback or on Kindle by following the links.

I still don’t know the answers

Yesterday was A-level results day, a day that creates almost universal anxiety followed by a range of emotions from great joy to overwhelming despair.

In a leak on Wednesday relating to grade boundaries, we learnt that to earn an ‘A’ in Maths, a student would only have to achieve a mark of 55%.  On first blush, to old duffers like me, that suggests that the examiners are going soft on students, making it easy to get great results.  It made me reflect on the 40% that I got for History in my University Bursary[1] exam in 1987.  By the standards of the day, I failed; translated to modern times, that might have been a B.

The reality is somewhat different.  My fail mark was thoroughly deserved.  Asking my friend Sally, on the day before the exam, to provide me with a summary of English History from 1558 to 1688 because I hadn’t bothered to read the text, might not have been the greatest strategy for passing.  It proved not to be, and not because Sally didn’t do a decent job – she was, after all, dealing with an idiot.

No, what the grade boundaries reflect is that this year’s Maths exam was really hard.  The BBC suggested that there was a new, tougher specification this year .  A friend’s son achieved the A* that he needed to be accepted to read Maths at University.  That meant he passed the paper with a result exceeding the overall Maths A* boundary of 72.3%.  When I sat my Maths exam, with a result of 74%, I was awarded a B.

Times have changed, grade boundaries are adjusted to reflect the body of results that are achieved by students across the country – it doesn’t mean that students are less bright than in our day (clearly not in my case) or that standards have diminished.  What it does mean, is that the grades awarded are a reflection of overall national performance. 

However, that does imply that comparisons of results from one year to the next are somewhat meaningless, given that there is an active focus from exam boards and regulators to maintain standards through the management of grade boundaries – at 97.6%, the overall pass rate in England, Wales and Northern Ireland was the same as 2018.  In an exam year where a grade C in Maths could be achieved with a result of 34.3% and a pass mark, an E, with just 14.3%, there is something clearly wrong with the level of difficulty in the paper.

Which leads me to the most troubling aspect of today’s system.  I vividly recall Son of GOM returning home from an exam during his A-level year, distraught at the difficulty of the paper.  No words of comfort from Mrs GOM or I could mollify him.  He carried a feeling of failure throughout the summer holidays, only to have it dispelled when the results came through and he achieved a better result than he’d feared.

By setting the difficulty of the papers too high, we risk disrupting the mental health of our children.  They are already driven to a performance expectation set by schools that reflects pressures from central government to achieve unsustainable improvements year-on-year.  As parents, we are also subject to influences that lead us to exacerbate the issue for our children, leading to a situation where, for some, the perception that any result below an A is poor.  Mrs GOM reminds me that, in her day, a B was considered to be a great result, and an A was outstanding.

This shift in mindset has led to a situation where students may be profoundly disappointed with the results that they have achieved.  The daughter of another friend achieved results for her A-level exams of A, B, B; better than required for her to pursue her chosen tertiary course, and results that we should celebrate.  Yet because of the pressures she felt, some self-imposed, she is unable to take satisfaction from what she has achieved.  That may change after a few days of reflection.  I hope it does, she’s done fabulously well.

Sadly, my father-in-law is no longer with us, but as the epitome of a GOM, he would bemoan the systems we have in place today, arguing that we make it too easy for teenagers today.  He would consider that a bone-idle historian, such as myself, should get everything that he deserves, and he’d be right.  But he would also disregard all argument to the contrary, despite having two daughters who work in education, who would seek to convince him that we’ve come a long way in improving today’s methods of teaching.

Despite being a GOM, he was a gentle soul, and whilst he’d probably argue (because he could) against the notion that today’s young people face pressures that we never experienced (albeit, he was fighting in WWII at the age of 18, so he’d have a strong point), he’d possibly have some sympathy for today’s youngsters.  The influences that they face are considerably greater and more widespread than we, as parents, probably realise.

As a collective, the government, educators and parents have a duty of care to ensure that we do what we can to reduce the mental health risks to our children by not laying a foundation for perceived failure.  I’m no authority – I didn’t have the answers in 1987 and I can’t pretend to have them now.  But what I do know, is that we should do better for our kids.

Twitter: @GOMinTraining
Copyright © Craig Brown, 2019
16 August 2019

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[1] University Bursary was New Zealand’s equivalent to England’s A-level exam in 1987

The many faces of mendacity

I have a confession to make.  I still use a dictionary.  Not the online, urban variety that suggests ‘summarise’ means ‘to get ready for warm weather’, but a real one; ‘The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English’, Eighth Edition, published in 1990 and printed on paper.

Occasionally, I’ll stumble upon a word that will see me plucking it from the bookshelf and flicking through its 1,500 wafer thin pages to find what has caused me to pause in my reading.  In March, a tweet from Stephen King introduced me to the word ‘mendacious’[1].  It’s a sorry reflection on the current state of our politics that I am now hearing it repeatedly.

Another tweet I saw asked the question “What do you miss most about the past?”  One respondent said, “When getting caught lying meant a politician would resign.”  It reminded me of how much we have seen the erosion of honour in our political class and why Boris Johnson’s claim to want to “restore trust in democracy” is so hollow.  There are few people who are less likely to achieve that aim.

We are accustomed to politicians obfuscating, it is what they do.  However, their deceits are increasingly choreographed by their closest and most senior advisors.  Tony Blair’s spin doctor, Alastair Campbell, ushered in the realm of the celebrity advisor; he was brusque and brutish at times, but seemingly pursued causes that were in the country’s best interests.  Today’s current batch are considerably more sinister, their dogma overshadowing what is good for society and nakedly focusing on implementing their ideology and the interests of their self-serving benefactors.

The Brexit Party, led by Nigel Farage, has Arron Banks’ financial and strategic input to thank for its rapid rise to prominence and its disproportionate presence on mainstream media.  Mr Banks is allegedly a character of dubious moral standing.  The Observer journalist, Carole Cadwalladr, delivered an excellent TED talk in June 2019 that exposed social media manipulation, in particular on Facebook, during the EU Referendum campaign and her subsequent claim that Banks had a “covert relationship” with, and had been offered money by, the Russian Government has led him to bring a libel action against her.  Banks is a bully.  His action is designed to threaten and intimidate Ms Cadwalladr and aims to cause her financial hardship.  She is going to fight him, provided he doesn’t bankrupt her in the process.  Ms Cadwalladr has launched a funding programme aimed at supporting her case.  She can be supported here.

Her claims may not be unsubstantiated.  A British parliamentary committee report concluded; “Arron Banks is believed to have donated £8.4m to the Leave campaign, the largest political donation in British politics, but it is unclear from where he obtained that amount of money”.  It goes on to state that “He failed to satisfy us that his own donations had, in fact, come from sources within the UK.”

Banks also hired Goddard Gunster who he credits with the Leave.EU campaign’s success, saying, “What [Gunster] said early on was ‘facts don’t work’.  The remain campaign featured fact, fact, fact, fact, fact.  It just doesn’t work. You have got to connect with people emotionally. It’s the Trump success.”  In other words – lie.

Banks and Farage learnt much about their tactics from the US where they enjoy access to Trump and the man who led his campaign, and possibly the most famous advisory protagonist of them all, Steve Bannon.  Bannon served as White House Chief Strategist for the first seven months of Trump’s term before their relationship deteriorated.  He also serves on the board of Cambridge Analytica, the data-analytics firm involved in the Facebook data scandal that Cadwalladr suggests illicitly harvested the data of 87 million people.  He’s much cleverer than Banks and considerably more dangerous, with a declared intention to become “the infrastructure, globally, for the global populist movement”.  I’m not sure how a person can become an infrastructure for a movement, but if there’s anyone that could achieve it, Bannon’s your man.

He has been described as a white nationalist but rejects the description, however, he is advocating for a global shift towards nationalism and actively supports extreme right-wing political parties in France, Hungary, Italy, Germany, Poland, Sweden, Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Spain and Finland.  He’s doing plenty to unite Europeans in the collective goal of dividing Europeans.

His latest leader of choice to influence is our very own Boris Johnson.  Talking about Johnson’s resignation speech as Foreign Secretary in July 2018, Bannon claimed, “I’ve been talking to him all weekend about this speech.”  For his part, Prime Minister Johnson has denied any association with Bannon, once describing the notion as “a lefty delusion.”  Who to believe?

Whether Johnson needs Bannon’s input is moot.  His poison pills are readily supplied by his own senior advisor, Dominic Cummings, a man so contemptible that Parliament is holding him in contempt after failing to appear before MPs investigating the proliferation of false news stories during the EU referendum campaign.

He served as the campaign director of the Vote Leave campaign and is said to have been the mind behind the bus message that falsely claimed we send £350 million a week to the EU and the misleadingly claims that Turkey was joining the EU.

Mr Cummings’ presence in Downing Street is troubling.  He demonstrates a massive disdain for politicians and the process of government.  Former Attorney General and Conservative MP for Beaconsfield, Dominic Grieve QC, launched an attack on Mr Cummings this week that described him as “arrogant” and “ignorant”.  When asked what he thought of the comments, Cummings brushed off the remarks telling Sky News, “I don’t think I am arrogant”, unequivocally proving that Grieve was right on both counts.

Mr Cummings has styled members of the ERG, a publicly funded research support group for Conservative MPs that is focused on the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, as “useful idiots”.  Jason Farrell of Sky News, one of the few people who has managed to interview him, reported that Cummings told him that parliament consists of people who “to a large extent are not particularly bright, are egomaniacs and they want to be on TV”.  He also claims that Cummings has referred to Eurosceptic MPs as “particularly unbalanced” and that some of the MPs he worked with during the campaign were “completely deranged”.  His lack of respect for politicians led him to tell Farrell that “99% of MPs are dreadful characters and if you want anything professionally organised you've got to exclude them, which causes a lot of trouble”.

This would lend credence to the suggestion that Mr Cummings is attempting to subvert democracy and the parliamentary process.  He appears to have no issue with forcing through a no-deal Brexit against Parliament’s wishes through proroguing, the shutting down of Parliament.  MPs wouldn’t have a say on proroguing, that power rests with the Queen, on the advice of the prime minister, and Boris Johnson hasn’t ruled it out.  This would potentially bring the Queen into the heart of the dispute, having to decide whether to accept or deny the request.  For a man who suggests he wants to restore trust in democracy, it’s had to imagine something more undemocratic.  The Vote Leave campaign focused on “taking back control” from the EU.  There is a rich irony that by proroguing Parliament to achieve that aim, control must first be removed from MPs.

Earlier in the week, Alastair Campbell wrote a scathing article about Dominic Cummings in The New European.  He cited the Channel 4 film ‘Brexit: The Uncivil War’, in which Benedict Cumberbatch played the role of the Vote Leave strategist.  Campbell, who understands these things better than most, thinks the portrayal may have gone to Cummings’ head.  He talks about his own time as the ‘power behind [Tony Blair’s] throne’ writing, “I always had enough awareness both of myself and of my boss, Tony Blair, to know that the reports and portrayals [of Campbell being ‘the prime minister's brain’] were wildly exaggerated.  Cummings, I suspect, has no such regard for Johnson, yet an infinitely large regard for himself and his own abilities.”

Campbell also suggests that the portrayal by Cumberbatch of Cummings as “a wild genius who single-handedly persuaded a country to vote for something you suspected would harm it” may have led him to believe his own legend and that he is “capable of doing other things no other man could - like delivering a no-deal Brexit without the government, the party of government, or the country imploding? And if Cumberbatch has helped to show the world that you could bend figures as varied as Johnson and Gove, Nigel Farage and Arron Banks and much of the media to your will, why on earth should you worry about 27 presidents and prime ministers and their European governments, the Queen, the civil service, 650 MPs and the rather inconvenient fact of a single digit, single vote majority in the House of Commons?”  Let us not forget that Cummings is the man who advised Michael Gove on the ill-informed reforms in education and is now belligerently advising Boris Johnson and his Cabinet colleagues on a catastrophic course of action.

Tom Peck, the Independent’s Political Sketch Writer, was no less erudite, and somewhat more irreverant in his assessment of Cummings, writing, “the latest self-appointed genius to run 10 Downing Street, is the most deluded of them all”.  Whilst his piece is amusing, it makes a little too light of the demagogue that Johnson has installed, although his phrase, “The world is burning, and the government is being run by an arsonist” rings far too true.

Lord Adonis, in The New European, also commented on Cummings calling him the ‘joint prime minister’ and saying, “Cummings is intent on jeopardising our entire political system”.  He suggests Cummings has an obsession with Otto von Bismarck, reminding us that “Bismarck's motto was ‘blood and iron’.  He hated not just socialists and the French but liberalism and European co-operation on any basis of human rights and conciliation.”  It is worrying that Bismarck is the inspiration of the man who has the ear of our Prime Minister.

Cummings is also reported as having briefed the special advisers to cabinet ministers of a “one strike and you’re out” policy in relation to his ban on leaks (unless they make him and the government look good, preferably in that order), reportedly warning them that “if you leak you are gone” and adding that “my worth to journalists is greater than yours. For the right story they will rat you out”.  It seems to have worked, almost 10 minutes passed before his briefing was shared with the press.

Further proving that he is a bully and indifferent to employment law, The Telegraph’s Chief Political Correspondent, Christopher Hope, reported that he also told the group that “if any of them tried to take him to an employment tribunal “you will be dead to me””.

Cummings has the ear of a man who he probably disdains, but who is Machiavellian enough to want him around – for now, but who will no doubt be as loyal to him as he has been to his previous two wives.  As Trump did for Bannon, Johnson is likely to do for Cummings, discarding him when he has served his useful purpose and he starts to become too embarrassing to protect.

The trouble is, between now and then, Mr Cummings is likely to do and cause a great deal of damage.

Twitter: @GOMinTraining
Copyright © Craig Brown, 2019
9 August 2019

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[1] If, like me, ‘mendacious’ is new to you, allow me to save you the trouble of reaching for the dictionary.  The OED says:  mendacious /mɛnˈdeɪʃəs/ adj. lying, untruthful.

Give him an inch...

Give him 2.54 cm and he’ll take 1.609 km

Credit: PA/ITV News

In the 1980s, a celebrity or politician had reached the height of fame if they were characterised as a puppet in the sketch show ‘Spitting Image’.  Famously, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and then Prime Minister, John Major, was given grey flesh-tones to reflect how dull and boring he was.

Oh, how I long for those days.

The principle of the programme was to satirise the rich, the famous and our rulers.  In today’s era of politics, puppets are no longer required, we have a live-action version.

I can envisage our current Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, wearing lie-detector underpants that administer an electric shock each time he tells a porky; it would serve to explain his ruffled hairline, however, I doubt there would be a battery pack powerful enough to last the day.

Whilst Boris may appear to be the standout politician for satirising, one must not overlook the exploits of our Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Esq., M.P.

Rees-Mogg has been busy creating material for the satirist.  Barely 24 hours had elapsed before he issued his style guide to the civil service, packed with grammarian rules and word exclusions. In an article written by Paul Brand, ITV’s Political Correspondent, it is stated that Jacob Rees-Mogg issued the following rules:

• Organisations are SINGULAR
•  All non-titled males – Esq.
• There is no . after Miss or Ms
• M.P.s – no need to write M.P. after their name in body of text
• Male M.P.s (non-privy councillors) – in the address they should have Esq., before M.P. (e.g. Tobias Ellwood, Esq., M.P.)
• Double space after fullstops
• No comma after ‘and’
• CHECK your work
• Use imperial measurements

He also published a list of banned words and phrases that include:

• Very
• Due to
• Ongoing
• Hopefully
• Unacceptable
• Equal
• Too many ‘I’s
• Yourself
• Lot
• Got
• Speculate
• ‘invest’ (in schools etc)
• No longer fit for purpose
• I am pleased to learn
• Meet with
• Ascertain
• Disappointment
• I note / understand your concerns

That prompted me to send a tweet to the Chief in Charge of Pomposity which read:

“Dear @Jacob_Rees_Mogg

Due to managing a lot of ongoing disappointment, I got your style guide late. I am pleased to learn about the very unacceptable use of commas after and, and I wanted to ascertain what else is no longer fit for purpose.

I note your concerns about the use of the archaic metric system, and would like to meet with yourself so that, hopefully, I understand your concerns. Also, I want to invest, but before I do, I think you should give equal thought to currency. Are the Government going to reintroduce shillings? I don’t want to speculate without knowing.”

I have yet to receive a response.

Whilst it might seem odd that such rules have a place in modern-day Britain, it should be remembered that Rees-Mogg has recently published a book entitled ‘The Victorians: Twelve Titans who Forged Britain’, which speaks to their exploits but which led A. N. Wilson in The Times to state “the author is worse than a twit” and called the book “morally repellent”.  Whilst Dominic Sandbrook, in his book review, adopted the epithets “bad, boring and mind‑bogglingly banal”.  One cannot help but think that the rules he has issued are just a cynical marketing ploy to promote his book.

Before blindly adopting Rees-Mogg’s cretinous edicts, it is worth noting that some of our grammar rules were set arbitrarily.  John Dryden, a 17^th century poet, literary critic, translator and playwright is believed to be the first person to suggest that English sentences should not end in prepositions.  He did this on the basis that Latin sentences cannot end in prepositions, ignoring the common use of the English language.  Splitting an infinitive was adopted for similarly mindless reasons in the early 19^th century, because in Latin the infinitive form is one word and impossible to split, although some would argue that’s not abso-fucking-lutely true.

Dryden is long since dead, but were he alive today, I suspect he’d have a seat in Cabinet next to Rees-Mogg as Secretary of State for Pedantry, drawing attention to such heinous crimes as Dominic Raab’s improper use of the split infinitive in, “Let us turn the country to complete shit.” or Priti Patel’s preposition ending statement, “An immigrant?  Kill it, I don’t even know what you let it in for.”[1]

Despite having set the rules, it would seem that Jacob Rees-Mogg is having a little difficulty following them.  ITV News found a transcript of one of his speeches that used “very” twice, “equal” once, “lot” once and “I” seven times.  According to ITV, he was even more self-centred in a speech on Brexit on 28 March 2018 when he used “I” 17 times, chucked in “very” on four occasions, used “lot” once and, outrageously, included the word “yourself”.  If the reviews of his book are anything to go by, I have a huge amount of sympathy for the poor schlub at ITV that had to pour over the transcripts.

It may be possible that we are close to tumbling out of Europe with a ‘no-deal’ Brexit because of these new rules and not because Boris would have us believe that a no-deal Brexit is the same as an agreed Brexit, just without the fries and a drink.  No, according to sources close to the negotiation (of which there are none), the real reason that we are likely to leave the European Union on 31 October without a deal, is because Jacob Rees-Mogg is not happy with the way the current deal is punctuated.  It seems we have reached an impasse, and that we are unlikely to arrive at an agreement with the Europeans any time soon.  As a bloc, the EU27 is totally intransigent on the use of the Oxford comma.

Twitter: @GOMinTraining
Copyright © Craig Brown, 2019
1 August 2019

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[1] Okay, they didn’t say those things, but it doesn’t take much to believe they would.

We're doomed

At the merest hint of trouble, Private Frazer was wont to wail, “We’re doomed!”  If John Laurie, the actor that portrayed him in ‘Dad’s Army’, was alive today, I would imagine those words would be getting a fresh airing.

We have a new Prime Minister, Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson.  The documentary maker behind 'The Life of Boris Johnson', Michael Cockerell, has said that, “when Boris was five, he told his sister Rachel that he wanted to be world king – he thought there was a position where you were king of the world.”

I’m not entirely certain that Boris’ view, or understanding, has changed.

Johnson’s credentials to be PM are, at best, limited.  He began his career in journalism at The Times but was sacked for falsifying a quotation.  He appears to have refined his technique for obfuscation (and outright lying) since then, which depressingly, has led to him becoming leader of the Conservative Party and, by extension, Britain’s 55^th Prime Minister.

Prior to his appointment, he spent just two years in cabinet and is generally regarded as the worst Foreign Secretary the country has ever had, although in one of the first appointments to his new cabinet, he’s given that job to Dominic Raab, which will likely remedy that situation.  Raab is the man who wrestles with the idea that, as an island, we need ports to manage the shipment of goods into the country, famously stating that he "hadn't quite understood" how reliant UK trade in goods is on the Dover-Calais crossing.

Boris had promised the most diverse cabinet ever assembled, so it was a little surprising to learn that the number of women in cabinet posts has reduced from 30% to 26%.  Still, he has appointed Priti Patel, as one of the six ministers that have a BME background, to the role of Home Secretary.  Patel’s Gujarati Indian parents migrated to the UK from Uganda in the 60s, fleeing Idi Amin’s regime.  You would think, therefore, that she might have some sympathy for the plight of asylum seekers, yet she has voted for a stricter asylum system, stronger enforcement of immigration rules and is against banning the detention of pregnant women in immigration jails.  It should also be remembered that she was forced to resign from government two years ago after it emerged that she had held secret, unofficial meetings with Israeli ministers and businesspeople.  She also advocated for the reintroduction of capital punishment, saying on BBC’s Question Time “The point is that [having capital punishment] is a deterrent.  Ethnically diverse?  Yes.  Culturally diverse?  Not so much.

In the interest of balance, and if it were justified, I would pass comment on the record of the members of the cabinet from the LGBT+ community, but there aren’t any.

It's great to see that another woman, Theresa Villiers, has been appointed to the role of Environment Secretary, bringing with her a history of repeatedly voting against measures to prevent climate change.  Her voting record also shows that she is highly supportive of fracking.  Watch that immovable timeline for taking action to save the planet pass us by.

Boris has of course made appointments that preserve the patriarchy, with 58% of his cabinet appointments going to white, middle-aged men.  These include Michael Gove, who’s been appointed to the role of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, often referred to as the Minister without Portfolio, a role in which he can hopefully do very little damage, having profoundly screwed up education in this country when he was Education Secretary.  I’m guessing that Boris decided to give him that role pretty quickly – keep him sweet but keep him quiet.

The Education post that Gove so artfully mismanaged, has gone to Gavin Williamson and, I suspect, secondary school children across the country are celebrating his appointment.  He’s the fella that Theresa May sacked when he was the Defence Secretary in a row over the leaking of information from the National Security Council.  With Williamson holding the Education portfolio, it should be quite easy for kids to get advance sight of exams papers.

There’s also room for nepotism and sycophancy in this Johnson government.  Jo Johnson, Boris’s brother, though not entrusted with a full cabinet role, has been appointed Minister for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, and Education, that last, presumably, to keep an eye on Gavin.  Jacob Rees-Mogg, the new Leader of the Commons, couldn’t have licked more backside in his tweeted support of Boris in the run up to his coronation, unless of course your yardstick for measurement is Lynn Truss, the new International Trade Secretary, who bested Rees-Mogg in the love-in.  Their tweets amounted to the primary school equivalent of “Pick-me, pick-me, I’ll be your best friend”.

There are other pockets of toxicity, most notably NOT in the cabinet.  Dominic Cummings has been appointed by Boris as his senior adviser.  His role has remarkable equivalency to the Donald Trump:Steve Bannon nexus that so polarised the US in the early days of Trump’s presidency.  Cummings was Gove’s adviser when he held the Education post and the campaign director for the Vote Leave campaign, which was found to have broken electoral law over spending limits by the Electoral Commission.  He was also held in contempt of Parliament for failing to respond to a summons to appear before, and give evidence to, the Culture, Media and Sport select committee.  Former Prime Minister, David Cameron, once described him as a "career psychopath".  Great choice Boris – clearly Cummings is a man of real character.

Of course, on this very black day, there is the joyous news that Boris hasn’t given a post to Chris Grayling, who’s time at the Justice Department was so astonishingly bad that Michael Gove had to come in and fix the mess; scrapping a prisoner tracking scheme, a prisoner book ban, legal aid cuts, court fees and a training deal with Saudi Arabia.  That was nothing when compared to his time at Transport where he awarded a £14m ferry contract to a ferry firm with no ferries and oversaw a disastrous train timetable launch that caused months of disruption for millions of passengers with MP Grahame Morris calling for him to quit saying, “The Transport Secretary isn’t fit to run a model railway.”  When last seen, Mr Grayling was found asking on which side of the house he needed to sit in the Commons.  The bus driver he was asking wasn’t sure.

Boris has been quoted as saying “My friends, as I have discovered myself, there are no disasters, only opportunities. And, indeed, opportunities for fresh disasters.”  I hope those words don’t prove to be prophetic.  It remains to be seen whether Boris and his colleagues can unite the country as he has promised.  Many of his critics say he is divisive and unprincipled, though tellingly, Nigel Farage, leader of The Brexit Party would be quite happy to form an electoral pact with him, but qualified his comments by adding “I don't believe a single word the Conservative Party tells us.”  Wonderful grounds for a trusting alliance.

Perhaps instead, we should reflect on the words of US president, Donald Trump, who in his characteristically eighth-grade English said, “They say Britain Trump, they call him Britain Trump”.  I’m sure Boris considers that a resounding endorsement from a mendacious, bigoted, racist, homophobic, dishonest, narcissistic, bullying, misogynist.

Those not prepared to support Johnson include Jo Swinson, the newly elected leader of the Liberal Democrats, who, on 25 July, called for Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Opposition, to support her by calling for a vote of no confidence, knowing that the 25^th is the final date that the motion can be called if there is any chance of a general election occurring before the 31 October deadline for Brexit.  The Labour party immediately rejected the motion, describing it as “childish and irresponsible game-playing by the Lib Dems” – like Johnson, Corbyn too, is unfit to lead.  Worryingly, whilst its Political Editor, Laura Kuenssberg, tweeted the news, the BBC chose not to mention it on its website, failing to report on what should be considered a significant event on the first day of Johnson’s premiership.

As a reminder that we may well have our own form of Trump as leader of the country, albeit a somewhat better educated and more eloquent version, I shall leave the last word, and a reminder of his guile, to Boris himself, who once stated that “My chances of being PM are about as good as the chances of finding Elvis on Mars, or my being reincarnated as an olive.”

Hmm …

Twitter: @GOMinTraining
Copyright © Craig Brown, 2019
26 July 2019