After that somewhat depressing post, let’s cheer up with…war. Here are the proceedings of a conference on whether or not the aid ISAF boasts of delivering in Afghanistan actually works, whether on its own terms or as a military strategy. I notice that “winning hearts and minds” has achieved the ultimate honour of being granted…
Read More some Afghanistan linksWell, this is grim. Intelligent comment is to be found here, in Jamie Kenny’s interview with David Wilson. Would you say that serial killers are a kind of negative indicator of the health of society in the sense that the fewer victims there are, the better society functions? Serial killers function best within fractured communities,…
Read More some memories of west BradfordI disbelieve strongly in all attempts to define “generation this or that”. So I was reading this with at least a pint of scorn, when it occurred to me that I was working in a tech start-up and I’d been to a 2-Tone gig at the weekend.
Read More uncannyI really need this book. It’s already on order. Relatedly, Chris Dillow points out that managerialism doesn’t work any better in the negative sense – cuts – than it does in the positive sense – spending, or at least, that as I’ve said before, if you believe the state is by definition incompetent to allocate…
Read More the big computerOK, so we took the piss out of the Policy Exchange crowd for seeing reds under the seats on the bendy buses. The group rights agenda. But the interesting thing about the Borisbus is that in a sense, it bears Dean Godson and Andy Gilligan out – design and architecture are, of course, deeply political…
Read More shower jobby: the politics of busesOK, so we took the piss out of the Policy Exchange crowd for seeing reds under the seats on the bendy buses. The group rights agenda. But the interesting thing about the Borisbus is that in a sense, it bears Dean Godson and Andy Gilligan out – design and architecture are, of course, deeply political…
Read More shower jobby: the politics of busesIt’s a rare day when Andrew Wakefield gets struck off and Nick Griffin is forced out of the BNP leadership. But this will not do: Today’s verdict ‑ the striking-off of Wakefield and Prof John Walker-Smith, who was in charge of the department of paediatric gastroenterology at the Royal Free hospital in London, where the…
Read More it’s not about the scienceHas anyone ever accused Amnesty International of being silent on (insert abuse here) and not been lying through their teeth? Seriously; I’ve had this argument so many times on the Internet since, ooh, 1996 or thereabouts. It always follows this pattern: A: Amnesty International says that some government/movement/company/faceless mob B supports is doing something incredibly…
Read More The Amnesty RuleWhat Sunny said. One of the most depressing things about the Labour leadership candidates’ focus on The Very Real Concerns is that it enforces a deeply negative, ungenerous, and futile definition of what those Very Real Concerns are. If you’re concerned about – to be brutal – the labour share of national income, and how…
Read More very real concernsAs relief from that 1,210 word wall o’text, this: Things to Make and Do was an oddly foreshadowing title for 1999.
Read More the tape recorder, for special music