CarlGardner.co.uk - Opinion

The Pope’s English Gambit

2009-10-28T16:20:01+00:00

An apostate's view

The Fire Window, Manchester Cathedral

We've heard a number of religious views about the Pope's extraordinary offer to allow Church of England priests who can't stomach women bishops to convert to Rome - even though some of them are married, and even being allowed to keep to some of their Anglican traditions. Some feminists have criticised it as predatory; some have predictably welcomed it, and some bishops look like taking it up. This is everybody's business, though, not just believers' business - just as much as …

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Dream no small dreams

2009-09-29T16:15:01+00:00

Gordon Brown's conference speech

It wasn't the game-changer Labour was crying out for - but Gordon Brown's speech to the Labour conference today was a much better effort than many expected, and approaches, at least, the kind of argument and the kind of vision he needs to set out if next year's election is to be a contest.

He opened by talking of changing the world: it was good, for Labour supporters, to see him lift his vision. But the bread and butter of winning for Labour is to flesh out that vision in a …

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Blog break

2009-09-14T10:45:01+00:00

You've not heard much from me recently - I've been taking advantage of the silly season to catch up on other things. And my blog break is going to continue for another week. I'm taking a complete break, getting away from everything, even the intarwebs thingy, and plan to recharge.

See you later in September.

Equality, not merit

2009-08-18T11:29:03+00:00

The past decade has seen widening differences in income and wealth, which taxation and regulation have failed to address. When New Labour was first elected, it established the Low Pay Commission to measure the claims of workers for a higher minimum wage against the wider economic impact, particularly on employment. There is now a compelling case for a high pay commission to measure the claims of top earners that their rewards are justified and necessary, even if they offend natural justice and our sense of fairness.

So wrote Vince Cable in yesterday's Guardian, supporting
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Lord Mandelson and cross-dressing

2009-08-11T12:58:01+00:00

He should shut up about it

Policy Network/CreativeCommons

Lord Mandelson has today accused the shadow chancellor George Osborne of "political cross-dressing". One one level, fair enough: if Osborne is claiming the Tories are the progressive party, then Mandelson is right to contest that. He is trying to steal Labour's clothes, to use a more traditional political phrase.

What worries me about Mandelson's choice of words, though, is the way it recalls Damian McBride's e-mail suggestion that the proposed website Red Rag should spread false rumours about there being photographs …

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Labour’s underdog strategy

2009-08-04T07:30:00+00:00

What could it mean?

Pixel Addict/CreativeCommons

On television last week, Lord Mandelson accepted Labour are the "underdogs" in politics now; and that therefore they'll have to work harder than they're opponents. It sounds as though Mandelson's been reading Morey and Miller's 2004 book The Underdog Advantage, on "using the power of insurgent strategy". Or perhaps Malcolm Gladwell's May New Yorker article on how David beats Goliath. Morey and Miller stress the importance for competitiveness of imagining you're an underdog, and of being perceived as underdog; Mandelson's suggestion that …

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Totnes

2009-07-30T08:49:00+00:00

The Tories' experiment deserves to succeed

Lawrie Cate/CreativeCommons

Needing to replace the ridiculous Anthony Steen, the Conservatives are choosing their candidate for his Totnes constituency by an open primary: all voters in Totnes have (in theory) been sent a voting pack with information about the would-be candidates and explaining how to vote by post. Michael Crick did an excellent report on the contest (beginning at 16.25 mins) on Tuesday's Newsnight, which is well worth watching. The process has had problems: Michael Crick suggested turnout may be very low, with …

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A highly amusing turn

2009-07-23T06:00:03+00:00

Slavoj Žižek

Andy Miah/CreativeCommons

Another Carl, the one at Raincoat Optimism, wrote this week about the possible application to "Red Toryism" of Slavoj Žižek's ideas about violence:

Early in 2008, philosopher Slavoj Žižek published a book entitled Violence: Six Sideways Reflections in which he aims to describe the differences between the violence we might see on the news in the form of thuggery and the violence incurred by the workings of the rogue bankers tweaking the economy. The difference, for Žižek, is the difference between “subjective” and “objective” violence. …

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Arguing for equality

2009-07-22T10:38:00+00:00

... and why I'm on "the left"

The website for Open Left, the new Demos project directed by James Purnell, asks us to submit our own views of what it means to be "on the left". I've submitted my own effort, which you can read here. Why I went on so much about noise and Islam, I've no idea but I think I've managed more or less to convey what I think are the most important issues for social democracy today.

I’m not sure I believe in a simple “left vs. right” model of politics. But …

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Truth, bias and blue taxis

2009-07-15T17:00:01+00:00

Is "base rate neglect" a load of tosh?

Matt Adams/CreativeCommons

Reading a blogpost from Chris Dillow about Kevin Pietersen led me via Wikipedia to a couple of interesting psychological hypotheses by Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman about bias, and the way it affects our judgments. First, the "availability heuristic", which does seem to me to have some relevance to criticism of KP's approach to batting (and indeed Chris's whole theory seems to me neatly to explain why Pietersen's test record is so much better than that of Mark Ramprakash and …

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My ZN5, and a hero

2009-07-01T14:57:01+00:00

My phone's a Motorola ZN5, which I have because I'm used to Motorola phones, the awful O2 offer me a good tariff, and I can't afford an iPhone.

It's far from perfect. The buttons are cleverly arranged so you keep unintentionally aborting texts or sending them unfinished, and are constantly going into the web browser without wanting to. Nor can you personalise the key functions. On the plus side, it does have a decent camera - quite a few of the photos on this site have been taken with it - so it …

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Iran’s human face

2009-07-01T09:54:00+00:00

Of course, educated folk will insist they have long been familiar with Iran's human face. They will point to art exhibitions such as Made in Iran, now in London, or Iran Inside Out in New York, movies including the new Shirin and the much-admired Persepolis, or memoirs such as Reading Lolita in Tehran. What's different about the last few weeks, however, is that this exposure to the complexity, variety and sheer humanness of Iran's people has become mainstream. This could cut both ways. Some Europeans and Americans might feel such empathy for the green revolutionaries that they …

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A great batsman and a great cricketer

2009-06-30T14:06:01+00:00

Michael Vaughan

gin soak/CreativeCommons (altered with permission)

Michael Vaughan, who's retired from cricket today, will of course be remembered as the captain who led England in one of its greatest summers. It started on a low: after great anticipation, England were humbled in the first test at Lords. But after a determined comeback and dramatic 2-run win at Edgbaston, the country was gripped with cricket fever for five weeks. We agonised over the drawn Old Trafford match that the Australians magnificently saved; we believed again, after England staggered home to go …

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Michael Jackson

2009-06-26T16:15:01+00:00

Was he any good?

Manfrys/CreativeCommons

He generated a lot of copy in life; and he's generating it in death, too. Much of that copy will be about Wacko Jacko, but any sort of artist deserves to have his work considered on its own merits - and I wonder whether his music even approaches justifying the genius tag often attached to him, or the scale of his fame.

Admittedly I may not be the best person to evaluate the Jackson oeuvre. I spent my teenage years between 1978 and 1984 largely eschewing …

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Mr Speaker Bercow

2009-06-23T22:11:01+00:00

The House's Jeeves

Paul Kehrer/CreativeCommons

I'd have voted for Richard Shepherd myself, had I been a MP; I think a Parliamentary romantic and confirmed freedom of informationer would have been the right man for the moment. I surprised myself by being impressed by Parmjit Dhanda's speech: I think some of his ideas were empty gimmicks, but he was right on the key point that the new Speaker must be a driver for change, not simply an enabler. But John Bercow's won, and, though some of his no doubt tactically leaked views …

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Blow, wind! come, wrack!

2009-06-05T19:30:00+00:00

Brown tries the last

John Martin, Macbeth

A dagger of the mind, proceeding from his heat-oppressed brain, marshalled his way for ten years before he used the instrument: Blair went, and it was done. He played most foully for it.

But now those voices that spoke his destiny have proved lying witches. The ghost of Brown's slain rival haunts the stage, his political offspring poised to inherit the future. Now the English counties have risen against Brown, reinforced with those who should be his.

The bloody, bold and resolute Prime Minister thinks …

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Right behind him

2009-06-05T17:00:00+00:00

With a knife in her handbag

FCO/CreativeCommons

Caroline Flint's behaviour over the last twenty hours or so is a lesson in how not to resign politically. She's known to have been a friend of Hazel Blears, and might have been expected to resign after James Purnell did. Her complaints about Gordon Brown's treatment of women is dynamite: if she's right, the Prime Minister is revealed as having a serious and unattractive character flaw, as well as politically inept. What's more, she's been his Europe minister, for heaven's sake. Resigning over the European …

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Purnell goes

2009-06-04T22:09:00+00:00

A bold Blairite move?

Policy Network/CreativeCommons

James Purnell's resignation tonight is a dramatic turn of events, no doubt. This is the leadership from Cabinet level I've said should be given if Gordon Brown is to be ousted. It turns the heat up considerably following Hazel Blears's resignation, making it more likely others will refuse to serve, in particular David Miliband; I think Brown is now on his way out. It's now public that John Reid told Brown to resign - he's made a non-denial denial; Barry Sheerman is asking for …

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Labour’s long knife

2009-06-03T07:00:00+00:00

It's time to force Brown out

ChodHound/CreativeCommons

Gordon Brown may be hanging on to power like grim death, but his government's collapsing around him. Jacqui Smith has already said she's going; the Cabinet Office minister Tom Watson has rightly resigned – and should certainly not be retained as an adviser. The Chancellor is about to exit 1 Horse Guards Road for the last time; and the Transport and Communities secretaries should go as soon as possible. The Culture and Northern Ireland secretaries and the Chief Whip should also fear for their …

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Fixed-term Parliaments: not the answer

2009-05-28T17:27:01+00:00

We also need to look seriously at the immense power prime ministers wield through their ability to call an election whenever they want. I know there are strong political and moral arguments against fixed-term parliaments. Political – because there's nothing worse than a lame-duck government with a tiny majority limping on for years. And moral – because when a prime minister has gone into an election and won it promising to serve a full term, but then hands over to an unelected leader halfway through, the people deserve an election as soon as possible. These arguments are of course particularly …

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