Layer 351 . . . The Pope, the Vatican, Beatification, Politics, Progressive Coalitionism, Clegg, Education, Football and Rooney

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Papism and Politics

This Pope's got a fucking cheek. He comes here for a 'State' visit and then immediately 'beatifies' Cardinal Newman - a murky character who's best remembered for leaving the C of E and going Catholic. And if that isn't a recruitment ploy, and also cocking a snook at the Anglican church, then I don't know what is.

There was a photo in the paper yesterday of His Popeness meeting and greeting a long line of VIP divs at Westminster Hall - Willie-waggler Hague, John & Norma Major, Tony and Cherie, Mad Thatch, Gordo . . . And Nick Clegg. (Was there anyone who was invited but decided not to go, I wonder?)

They all came running to honour our Very Important Guest. You have to wonder who the fuck proposed a State Visit for the Head of State of . . . The Vatican. Which genius was that? What's that all about? Who needs it? Who's paying for it? (Us) And the Vatican isn't even a city, or a town - let alone a fucking state. This is all bollocks.

It has an area of approximately 44 hectares (110 acres), and a population of just over 800.
- Wikipedia

Benedict XVI, nee Ratzinger - or XVI as he likes to be known - is a comic-book Pope with a comic-book German accent who was a member of the Hitler Youth - which some think is an excellent qualification to become the head of another monolithic organisation with a desire to infect the entire planet with its bizarre, dangerous and reactionary ideology, and its habit of issuing instructions on how to live your life. "You vill obey!!" "Vimmen - stay at home!" "No condoms!" "Homos - go avay!"

And yet, as he made his stealthy way up the Vatikan, or Watikan, or Whatdickan, hierarchy, he was a man who was personally and directly involved in not only covering up child abuse but also making sure the perpetrators were never brought to civil and criminal justice, whenever possible. And in spite of accepting recommendations to do so, the RCs have yet to expel from their ranks most of those who have been identified as child abusers.

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Clegg, Fairness, and Education

Speaking of Nick Clegg -  he was on the Andy Marr prog this morning. Very good he was too. Personable, relaxed, human, quick, clever . . . And I'm not going to put him down. Clegg and Cameron are both impressive. Cameron was very gracious, very warm and generous towards Harriet Harman last week during PM's questions, as she made her final appearance as acting Labour leader. He's clearly a decent man, and he's had a lot of personal tragedy to cope with.

Compared with the New Labour freaks vying for the leadership - Milibands, Balls, and the other one - Clegg & Cameron look and sound reasonable, personable and human - not fucking political robots. (Abbott's also a wierdo, but at least she's not New Labour.)

The toughest question Clegg had to deal with today was the charge that the coalition is not carrying out its pledge to make everyone suffer equally from its slashing and burning - and that the richest people haven't suffered at all. Clegg rightly said that the current analysis from those who claim unfairness assumes that the current conditions will remain the same. Whereas - according to him - the coalition plans to create budgetary changes to tax and benefits which will ensure that the rich pay more and the poor pay less. Which is something that New Labour clearly failed to do. We shall see.

To his credit he sounded as though he really meant it. All politicians are actors, but this doesn't mean they never have a core of honesty or decency. I'd rather trust Clegg and Cameron than the New Labour Continuity candidates, and I say this as a lifelong socialist to whom fairness and social justice is all. I suspect I'd also enjoy a conversation in the pub with them more than with the NuLab gits, even if we never agreed about a single policy or principle. C & C may both be conservatives, but they say, at least, they believe in progressive conservatism. And they don't, as far as one can see, have a track record of being lying slimeballs who collaborated with the likes of Blair and Bush and the whole of the neo-conservative/New Labour 'project'.

The other thing, and the most important thing, I really liked about Clegg's statements today was on the subject of education. He rightly said that New Labour's approach had been all about central direction and dictation, combined with divide and rule - one rule for the Academies and another for the rest. He said he'd visited many 'free' schools in Holland and Scandinavia and was impressed with how they were run and what they offered. He said he wants freedom for all teachers and heads in this country to do whatever's right for their school, supported by a more progressive and fairer allocation of resources to schools. And you can't say fairer than that.

It's a fact that every school is different, faces different sets of problems according to its pupil and staffing needs, will therefore have different priorities and constraints, and requires different approaches to its curriculum, pedagogy and organisation as it proceeds along a time line towards whatever 'ideal' state is decided upon by its governors, staff, parents and pupils. Some schools, for example, have yet to realise that the wellbeing of pupils and their enjoyment of school is the key to everything. Being motivated to learn drives all achievement. Hating and resenting school ruins everything - even for the staff. Having a real  and lifelong love of learning for its own sake is the greatest good. Being constantly beaten over the head to jack up exam scores is not guaranteed to produce high achieving pupils or teachers, let alone rounded individuals who embrace school life and look forward to each day.


More power to Clegg's elbow, say I, and I wonder whether he's spoken with Gove about his thoughts on education policy?

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Football, Flintoff and Rooney

Two excellent pieces in yesterday's Guardian, ostensibly on the subject of sport.

"Assailed on all sides by spin and vested interest it is more important than ever to make a clear distinction between things that are actually, properly over – albeit still hanging about the place making comebacks and doing interviews – and those that are simply in recess, but still worthy of our urgent interest.

David Beckham, for example, is over. Famous but over. Talented but over. Over with an agent. Andy Murray is not over, but perhaps repeatedly attempting to bully him into winning a grand slam is over. The Lampard-Gerrard "conundrum" is over. The England football team are over. England, generally, is over. Cars are over. Small, very expensive organic chickens with pretend-homemade plastic packaging are over. The phrase "properties of this quality very rarely come on to the market" is over. Twenty20 cricket is over. Opening up a pretentious high-end coffee cart in the East End of London, growing a straggly beard and talking in a sniffy voice about the quality of your roast is over. Telephones with wires are over. In fact, pretty much everything is over apart from China, pornography and multiplying legions of sub-KFC fried chicken outlets called Chicken Shed and Chicken Bungalow and Chicken Loft.

Plus of course Rooney: Rooney is not over. Flintoff's retirement may have come with an earned sense of relief from his creaking knees, those unreliable hinges and cranks. But Rooney still pulses with angry vitality, still carrying with him the imprint of his career high with England at Euro 2004, the Croatia defence scattered like late-night kebab salad brushed angrily to the pavement, tongue lolling like a length of prime luncheon meat, seeing in front of him only the engorged and pulsing flower of the goal between its vulvic posts and demonstrating, in effect . . . tremendous quality from the young lad.

For Rooney, the enemies of promise are more diffuse, and not solely confined to tabloid entities known as Rooney Hooker and Rooney Threesome Girl and even Rooney Hooker Dad. There is also expectation: the fact that we now look for, and expect to find, inveterate decline beneath the star-burnish."

- Barney Ronay
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/sep/18/england-andrew-flintoff-wayne-rooney

What Won't Happen This Week

Sir Alex Ferguson announces that Wayne Rooney will not be playing against Liverpool as he feels the striker needs to be "protected from football". "It's appalling what goes on. It sickens me. It's totally unnecessary - 22 men in shorts chasing a piece of leather around. It's nonsense. Nobody should be subjected to that." Fears are raised that Sir Alex's move may set a precedent with dozens of top-class celebrities being withdrawn from matches to protect them from penalty misses, falling over, or just standing with their mouths open making uncomprehending gestures, leading to them being laughed at by luxury call girls in night spots. PFA chief Gordon Taylor observes, "The level of abuse these young men suffer as a result of football is appalling. The sooner the FA moves in and clamps down on the game, possibly even bans it altogether, the sooner these lads will be able to get on with their lives."

- Harry Pearson

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Layer 350 . . . Mexico, Drugs, Revolution, Britain, Smashing the State, The Pope, Religion, SEN and Patience

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It's real autumn - tomatoes continuing to ripen, chilli peppers, sunflower seeds harvesting, apples, pears and damsons from friends' trees, etc.

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Someone on the radio said he'd learnt the secret of happiness from a food container: Stand Upright in a Cool Place.

Two challenges here. How to stand upright. Finding a cool place to make your stand.

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Continuing with thoughts about Mexico and revolutionaries -

Mexico's modern revolutionaries

As Mexico marks its 1810 and 1910 uprisings, 2010's upheaval is likely to be about drugs, not politics

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/sep/12/mexico-revolution-drugs-uprising

This week sees the 200th anniversary of Mexico's war of separation from Spain; in addition, 20 November marks the centennial of Mexico's landmark revolution, the first mass uprising of the underclass in the Americas. The coincidence of centennials has given breath to the hypothesis that Mexico explodes every 100 years in social upheaval, and some leftists are eagerly expecting renewed fireworks in 2010. Indeed, conditions are ripe for revolution here: 70% of Mexico's 103 million population teeter on and around the poverty line.

Revolutions don't happen unless the working class is angry. Electricity workers recently mounted a mass hunger strike (they lasted 90 days) in the main plaza of Mexico City to protest at the loss of their jobs to privatisation.

Today full-scale urban warfare rages on the streets of Juárez – over 1,800 citizens have been slain in the first eight months of the year in firefights between drug gangs and the Mexican military. Car bombs detonate on downtown streets and the mansions of the wealthy are looted and torched. Narco-commandos attack police stations and army barracks, carrying off artillery, and prisoners are broken out of jails much as they were by revolutionaries a century ago.

The Mexican military and the US North Command – for which Mexico is the southern security perimeter – have long expected the narco-gangs and leftist revolutionary bands to coalesce. But revolutionaries in their armchairs complain that revolutions must have ideologies and display class allegiances: this narco-insurrection seems to be all about barbaric killing and taking power, not the liberation of the working class.

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The drugs issue is hotting up. Even The Economist is running major features on the arguments in favour of following Portugal and decriminalising drugs. Portugal now has one of the lowest levels of drug use in Europe, according to The Economist.

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Meanwhile, back in Britain, it seems it's the government itself that wants to start a revolution:

Yes, the coalition wants to smash the state. That's good

The misery of cuts will grind the government down unless it boldly declares the ideology behind its spending plans

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/sep/12/coalition-smash-state-cuts-ideology

This is an ideological government with a plan for a smaller, less centralised and more liberal state. The left dreads the obvious fact that spending cuts are central to this plan – and they are. The left senses that the government is staging a cultural revolution against social democracy – and it is. The coalition does not want to make mild adjustments to the old order. It intends to smash it.

To say that cuts are being forced by necessity and nothing more, is to imply that when fatter times return ministers will reverse them. Nobody who knows the leaderships of this coalition believes that. Much of what the government must do to balance the books it would have wanted to do even if they were in balance.

The point of reducing spending is to change the state, not just spend less.

There's a kamikaze spirit in this government's soul. Ministers seem strangely pacified by the prospect of their possible political doom. New Labour feared unpopularity so much it became timid. This government has written unpopularity into the script. This has freed it to do things it would never have risked in fiscal peacetime. It is why change seems reckless and fast. The coalition feels a revolutionary duty to be brave. It should be proud of that.

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HOWEVER . . .

Financial markets are still ruled by instant gratification

Two years after the collapse of Lehman Bros, it's hard to find much sign of the fundamental reforms we were promised

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/sep/13/economics-recession-globalisation-rebalancing-reform

The crisis exposed the structural weaknesses of the bubble years and policymakers said what they always say at this point in the economic cycle: never again. Faced with evidence of the fragility of globalisation, they announced that the system required fundamental reform. At this juncture, it is appropriate to assess how they have been getting on.

The Demand for Immediate Gratification.

Andrew Haldane, Bank of England executive director for financial stability, said recently in Beijing that rapid gains in economic growth in the modern age were accounted for by patience: investing for tomorrow meant sacrifice today.

"Studies have shown that happy people save more and spend less," he argued. "Happy people also take longer to make decisions and expect a longer life. In short, they are patient. These patterns are connected and reinforcing."

But patience does not always triumph. When impatience takes control, we save less and borrow more. We take snap decisions, thinking little about long-term consequences. This sort of behaviour, as Haldane noted, reaches its apotheosis in the financial markets. "Most traders' brains harbour the impatience gene. Often they harbour little else."

So, it would be a real sign of progress if there was evidence that the gods of the financial markets were re-learning the virtue of patience, thus setting an example to mortals. The sad fact is nothing has changed. The business-as-usual mindset makes the case for reform even more compelling.

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Simon Hattenstone's interview with Sinead O'Connor is well worth a read. It seems she's a total believer in God and Jesus, but hates the Pope, who arrives here tomorrow, and the whole of the Christian hierarchy of priests and bishops.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/sep/10/sinead-oconnor-pope-visit

Sinead O'Connor: 'The Vatican is a nest of devils'

When she tore up the pope's picture as a protest against child abuse, people thought she was loopy. But Sinead O'Connor – former pop star, priest, newly married mother of four – won't say 'I told you so'

She says, apart from her children, her ordination is her greatest achievement. "I am proud that I did listen to that voice inside me rather than be intimidated by men telling me you can't be a priest. One ought to be more concerned in obeying what the Holy Spirit inspires you to feel rather than what a bunch of men in fucking dresses are telling you to do or not do."

I'm still trying to work out her position – she loves God, but despises Catholicism? She shakes her head. "No, what I think is wrong is that the people running the show are misrepresenting what Catholicism actually is ... what I'm talking about is the highest echelons of the Vatican't as I call it."

"The way they've behaved just in the last 20 years, over this issue of sexual abuse, shows they don't give a shit. They feel untouchable. And to me it seems they don't believe in God at all. Because if you did believe you couldn't stand in front of that spirit covering up and moving priests and doctoring reports to psychiatrists and not telling them there was a suspicion of abuse, you just couldn't do that."

"OK, the abusive priests have been dealt with and that's very important, but now what has to be dealt with is the criminality of the cover-up." She says it has to go to the very top – after all in 2001, Pope Benedict, as Cardinal Ratzinger, issued an updated edict instructing the world's bishops to silence all abuse allegations or risk being thrown out of the church. "The Vatican is a nest of devils and a haven for criminals. It's evil, the very top of the toppermost is evil."

O'Connor is clear what has to happen – those responsible have to go. "And when all the those guys stand down we should take back the church for us." Would she like to see a democratically elected pope? "Do we need a fucking pope? Why do we need a pope? Christ doesn't need a representative. Ten years from now the church will be nothing resembling what it has been."

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Also on the subject of the Pope and religion:

The pope's priestly model: a rabid, self-harming tyrant

The Catholic priesthood needs radical reform. Yet Benedict looks to a cleric who banned dancing and whipped himself nightly

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/sep/10/pope-benedict-xvi-catholicism

What has the pope done about the crisis? What he hasn't done is to initiate reforms based on inquiries into the culture of the total clerical crisis. His solution to the complex problems of clericalism is to ask seminarians and priests to emulate a French priest called Jean Vianney, who died 150 years ago.

Last year Benedict was on the verge of proclaiming Vianney as the patron saint of parish priests, the model for a purer, healthier, irreproachable priesthood. In a scolding letter to the Irish clergy earlier this year, the pope asserted that following the life of Vianney would redeem Ireland's disgraced, abusing clergy. At every opportunity he has promoted Vianney as exemplary.

The promotion of Vianney seems to me the most backward-looking of this pope's initiatives, which include bringing back the Latin mass, routinely denouncing homosexuality, and declaring the ordination of women a great sin.

What is the holy father thinking of, promoting this self-harming, narrow-minded tyrant as a solution to the problems of paedophile priests? Even by a mild interpretation, we should infer that priests must turn parishes into spiritual ghettoes where all secular influences are banned. Masochistic displacement activity, the punishing of the flesh, is proposed as a substitute for personal maturity and integrity.

In other words - spiritual intelligence.

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Special Educational Needs in the press today, and on the 'Today' programme this morning:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/sep/14/special-education-needs-school-young

'Special' education comes in many different guises

Some school students need extra support to liberate them from the constraints with which their world tries to strap them down

Young people in our schools, particularly challenging inner-city schools, do need special educational provision to liberate them from the constraints with which their world attempts to strap them down.

Schools have a duty to provide these young people with the tools to enable them to break free from these constraints, to drive up self esteem, aspiration and expectation, and to take their rightful place at the table of learning.

Schools and teachers cannot do this alone. It is a multi-agency agenda of skilled professionals working alongside the most committed, hardworking, diligent and skilful teachers that can create this climate of success.

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