Friday, June 23, 2006

Tony Blair - mediaeval madman?

You have to get 43 paragraphs into his speech on anti-social behaviour ("ASB", apparently) before you get to what he's really getting at.

Unfortunately, most journalists seem only to have made it to paragraph 38, where he mentions (among many other reasons, all to do with the shifting nature of social relations and structure during the last century - although most of them actually started with the dawn of the industrial age) "mass migration".

Some sections of the press, skimming through, seem to think this means he's blaming crime on immigration in yet another attempt to pander to the tabloids. He's not. At least, not really.

Blaming crime on newcomers and darkies may be populist for some sections of society, and may provoke others into blind rage, but the real worry is Blair's categorical statement that he supports "summary justice" - also known as "arbitrary justice", more properly described as "punishment based on accusation, not evidence":

"Because we care, rightly, about people's civil liberties, we have, traditionally, set our face against summary powers; against changing the burden of proof in fighting crime; against curbing any of the procedures and rights used by defence lawyers; against sending people back to potentially dangerous countries; against any abrogation of the normal, full legal process.

"But here's the rub. Without summary powers to attack ASB - ASBO's, FPN's, dispersal and closure orders on crack houses, seizing drug dealers assets - it won't be beaten.

"That's reality. And the proof is that until we started to introduce this legislation, it wasn't beaten"
That's right, folks - "anti-social behaviour" has been "beaten". He continues:
"Without the ability to force suspected organised criminals to open up their bank accounts, disclose transactions, prove they came by their assets lawfully, you can forget hitting organised crime hard. It won't happen."
Yep - sod evidence, sod the rule of law. Sod legal rights that have been established for centuries and survived riot, rebellion and revolt in tact.

The really odd thing, however, is that near the start of his lengthy speech (though soon countered with statistics suggesting a severe decline in law and order since the 1950s), Blair insists that crime has gone down since 1997 and seems to acknowledge that public fear of crime has risen disproportionately to the overall crime rate. In other words, that the problem is all perception, not reality. He argues first that there is no crisis, then uses the same non-existent crisis to propose fundamental changes in the way this country works.

He again repeats '97's mantra "Tough on Crime, tough on the causes of crime", yet dismisses all explanations of causes - from the "criminals are evil" brigade on one extreme to the "crime is caused by poverty and desperation" lot on the other.

In fact, Blair seems to have no idea what causes crime whatsoever. Which is fair enough, in many ways, as it's bloody complex. You'd be an idiot if you thought you could explain the thing. Which means you'd also an idiot to try and tackle its causes if you have no idea what those causes are.

So it's only appropriate that the causes of crime get not a single look-in during Blair's speech. No appeals to improved education, to fostering community relations (no mention of the Respect Agenda either - remember that?), to providing opportunities that may give alternatives to crime.

Instead, he focuses exclusively on how best to ensure criminals (both proven and suspected) are punished. And this is punishment as deterrant, not punishment as rehabilitation.

In other words, having again used the line about "fighting 21st century problems with 19thcentury solutions", Blair is proposing a return to pre-19th century solutions, where punishments were vastly disproportionate to the offence.

Blair's vision of justice is a medieval one - inflict so much harsh retribution on people who you think have failed to abide by the law that all live in terror of the power of the state, and only the most desperate or depraved resort to crime - only to be met by a system of justice that allows little or nothing in the way of defence (hence his mention of "curbing... the procedures and rights used by defence lawyers"). The summary justice apparently approved of by Blair is little better than branding, trial by combat, or throwing suspected witches into a river.

Ah, but how silly of me:
"Each time someone is the victim of ASB, of drug related crime; each time an illegal immigrant enters the country or a perpetrator of organised fraud or crime walks free, someone else's liberties are contravened, often directly, sometimes as part of wider society... if they [suspected terrorists] aren't deported and conduct acts of terrorism, their victims' rights have been violated by the failure to deport."
Of course - the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few... (A twisted utilitarianism, Tony? I thought you'd already rejected the 19th century's contributions to the way we look at the world?)

But then comes the admission - hidden way down in the middle of the speech - of what the real thinking is here:
"even if they [suspected terrorists] don't commit such an act or they don't succeed in doing so, the time, energy, effort, resource in monitoring them puts a myriad of other essential task at risk and therefore the rights of the wider society."
In other words, to save time and - especially - money, it's better to punish the innocent.

With such brilliantly logical thinking, why not just shoot everyone in the head at birth? That'd prevent them from committing any crimes and save a lot of time, energy, effort and resources and all...

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

DANGER: tediously overwrought political footballing metaphor approaching*

As if the team's performances on the pitch weren't boringly average enough, we now get our two options for next Prime Minister acting like primary school kids fighting over who had the "best" seat at the football. "Best" here meaning "most like ordinary people", apparently.

As such, by Labour's definition, "ordinary" is being given a ticket to a world cup match by the government of the host country - the Tories think it's flying by private jet to take up a ticket donated by the company broadcasting the match in the UK.

(Note to Brown and Cameron - grow up and get on with your jobs, you infantile morons.)

Both Brown and Cameron are somewhat like the current England team, come to think of it - their hardcore supporters think they've got a real chance but everyone else knows they're lucky to have got as far as they have; they show occasional flashes of brilliance, more often brief spells of mere competence, yet you always have a sneak feeling that when they do well it's only a fluke; and they're both not only really rather dull but also lack the ability to inspire enthusiasm from those not already converted to the cause.

(Note to the England team - please get knocked out by Ecuador and save us from further bromidic, pedestrian, somniferous performances.)

* sod it, everyone else is doing it - something to do with this World Cup business, I suppose...

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Hi, my name's Tony, and I love the environment - Labour have just thrown away their "Cameron's an environmental hypocrite" card...

The oddness of international law (part 234): Montenegro's independence has finally allowed the country to conclude a peace treaty with Japan. Europe's newest state had technically been at war with the land of the rising sun since the 1904-05 Russo-Japan War - in much the same way that the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed and Russia were supposedly in a state of war from 1853 to 1966 (when a Soviet official and the mayor of the town formally ceased hostilities, the latter supposedly asking his commie counterpart to "Please tell the Russian people that they can sleep peacefully in their beds").

Monday, June 19, 2006

In case you missed it, final proof that the EU is interminably dull: even Eddie Izzard can't make it entertaining. (But he does try, bless him...)

(Oh and a handy summary of the outcome of last week's summit - the EU's in a holding pattern for another couple of years at least. There's a surprise...)

Lacking the facility to do a screengrab before they realise the cock-up, nonetheless this is worth flagging. A BBC news story with the headline "Homes crisis 'down to immigration'" would tend to make you think that an official body has swallowed the BNP line. In fact, the summary of the story reads "The UK housing shortage is mainly down to single households not immigration, says the government."

This is why Sub-editors need to pay attention...

More hearteningly, the first page of most recommended comments for the BBC's Have Your Say: Should paedophile laws be changed? is amazingly (currently) not full of extremist rantings for a change. In fact, only one comment on that page appears to think that scaremongering is a solution - and only one other demeans itself by arguing (I paraphrase) "it's not paedos that's the problem - it's foreigners".

£12.4 billion for an overdue computer system? Double the original estimated cost? Fears of the National Identity Register are declining...

But hell - that's three times the cost of invading Iraq, for Christ's sake! We could have whooped some filthy foreign terrorist arse in Iran, North Korea and France by now if it weren't for those dodgy PCs.

(And yes, I know I'm behind with this, but my computer died over the weekend...)


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