The Obscurer
Month: June, 2008
Thursday 19th June 2008
πr²
They say Pensioner Pie is back in style. I say it never went out. Of style.
Tuesday 17th June 2008
What A Shower
Fund manager Mark Mobius of Templeton Asset Management was interviewed about investing in emerging markets on the BBC’s Working Lunch programme last week. The interviewer, Nik Wood, began by asking just what an emerging market is.
It was actually the IFC, the International Finance Corporation at the World Bank. They were struggling with what to do with these underdeveloped countries, the poor. They were referred to as underdeveloped, poor, the South, so forth and so on, and … one gentleman from the IFC was in his shower in Washington one morning and he came up with the idea of emerging market which was a more optimistic name.
The shower? I have to wonder what IFC man was up to in the shower when the word “emerging” popped into his head, but I really don’t think I want to know.
Monday 16th June 2008
What Do You Get If You Multiply Six By Nine?
David Davis’s decision to stand down as an MP and fight a by-election on the subject of civil liberties, be it brave, foolish, principled or vain (and it is probably all four), will only become interesting to me in the unlikely event that it resolves some of those unanswered questions raised during the debate over 42-days detention. I have to doubt that Davis can provide me with those answers by fighting shadows in a by-election when a he didn’t manage it as shadow home secretary, but if he pulls it off he will have done me a great service.
I think I am a bit erratic on the matter of civil liberties. I am dead against ID cards, although for now it is mainly for the pragmatic reason that they are a monumentally ineffective waste of time and money. I similarly oppose the proposed database that will run alongside the cards, but I can see some worth in the similarly gargantuan NHS “spine”. The DNA database’s reach is far too extensive, but the profusion of CCTV cameras, whether state or privately owned, does not leave me over-fussed. On the matter of detention without charge I opposed the extension to 90 days in terror cases and I oppose the 42-day move now. I’m all over the place really, although perhaps no more than David Davis himself, a curious “libertarian” who despite his recent protestations is socially conservative and an authoritarian on many issues, supporting the repeal of the Human Rights Act and also – as many have pointed out – in favour of the death penalty. So while he is appalled by the metaphorical “slow strangulation of fundamental British freedoms” he is far more relaxed about the literal, brisker, honest-to-goodness strangulation of a human being in a noose. He is against the state retaining our DNA and storing it in a vial but is happy to afford it the power to erase us from the face of the earth.
It is easy to pick holes in what passes for the government’s case for 42-days. I have little doubt that Labour’s main reason for pushing the bill forward was political, to triangulate and to sound tough on terror while painting the Tories as weak. Certainly it is the case that some terrorists have been held right up to the current 28-days limit – just as the previous limit of 14-days was occasionally approached – but isn’t that the way with deadlines? If I am given 4 weeks to complete an assignment then it will take me 4 weeks; give me a 2-week extension and it will take 6 weeks.
And yet; I am not whole-hearted in my opposition to this bill, primarily because as I have no experience of investigating a terror plot I have no knowledge of what it actually entails. Certainly the government hasn’t effectively made the case for why the change it is needed, but the opposition hasn’t convinced me that it isn’t. It is an unpleasant feature of our parliamentary democracy that the whips operate to push MPs through the lobby to vote for their party rather than with their conscience and some of the reported horse-trading in last week’s vote reflects badly on the government, but I have heard far worse cases of bullying and intimidation under previous votes and governments; the whips work on both sides and it would be interesting to see how a genuinely free vote would have gone when many Tory MPs would have voted for 42-days rather than against the government. Much of the opposition case seems to be shrill and hyperbolic, to exhibit some unavoidable gravitational pull towards Latin, where Magna Carta, habeas corpus and cave canem get waved around for no very good reason, and where opposing 42-days is made to sound synonymous with supporting civil liberties. Sure, many of those in favour of 42-days can also some make utterly stupid points in response by, for example, saying they don’t care how long terror suspects are banged up for as long as we are kept safe, but I can easily dismiss such Daily Mail-style wing-nuttery as I don’t feel the need to understand and sympathise with such rabid nonsense. Not so the arguments made by liberals, and David Davis; but the latter’s speech to parliament in the debate on the bill was typically full of emotive talk of innocent people being dragged from their homes in the early hours and hurried away from their famillies and jobs to be slammed in a cell for weeks on end; true, of course, and uncomfortable to admit perhaps, but these facts apply as equally to the 28-day limit which Davis supports as to the 42-day limit he opposes.
But it is when the bills opponents compare the UK’s record with other countries that I become most concerned about the arguments being made. It is commonplace to blithely state that we already have the most draconian terror laws going, and Liberty published a document detailing how out of step the British legal system is, but what does that mean? Some things don’t seem to add up. Italy, for example, is said to be able to make do with a mere 4 days detention prior to charge, yet in the Meredith Kercher case I remember it being stated that the suspects can be held for up to a year pending investigation, the 4 day limit apparently being for the courts to authorise the initial arrest. Italy is a civil-law country and so the comparison may not be exact (which is part of the problem here) but what of other common-law countries? In the United States, when not being held indefinitely in Guantanamo Bay, Liberty state that suspects can only be held for 2 days prior to charge, but again comparisons seem misleading. My understanding is that in the States it is the norm to charge suspects with a lesser crime and then use post-charge questioning to get at the real reason for the arrest; but is that really any improvement on the British system? It doesn’t seem a victory for civil liberties if we move over to a procedure where you can be arrested for some trumped up trifle – tax evasion…jaywalking? – and to then be held for as long as a friendly judge refuses bail. You still won’t know why you have really been arrested, you still can’t prepare your defence for the genuine case ahead, and it all seems to lead to a far less transparent system, with nothing like the judicial oversight that exists in the UK. In Canada, another common law country, under most circumstances charges actually need to be laid prior to an arrest – which certainly suggests a low level of evidence is required – and anyway within 24 hours. It beggars belief that the Canadian and British police are working under truly comparable systems or else we have to believe that our coppers are 42 times more lazy than the Canadians; but I guess I don’t know.
My problem here is that while I instinctively support Liberty in its endeavours some of its claims seem disingenuous which undermines the case, as if they are playing fast and loose with the evidence in order to take a utopian line on civil liberties. It is easy to oppose 42-days on a high-minded principle when it isn’t your arse on the line if the current 28-day limit means you have to let a genuine terrorist go free; easy to tell others how to do a job you have no intention of doing yourself and to still keep yourself free to criticise if things do go wrong; easy enough to do it and stay put. No, the antis haven’t convinced me of their case; ultimately it comes down to how much time the police actually need to do the job, and that is something I simply don’t know.
But the antis don’t have to convince me, it is the pro-42-dayers who are seeking a change to the status quo, it is they who have to do the convincing. Some senior police officers may well want more time to question suspects, but who wouldn’t like more time in which to do their job? Just because they want it doesn’t mean they need it; if the police are given 42 days then they will certainly use them, but while that could be out of necessity it is as likely to be out of risk-aversion, to continue to hold people against whom there is no evidence just to be on the safe side. Neither side in this argument has persuaded me, but liberty is too vital an issue to take lightly. As in law, then, it is for the Crown to make its case beyond reasonable doubt. This is something it has signally failed to do.
Thursday 12th June 2008
Jumped Up
Yesterday our aging Rover 216 sailed through its MOT*; much to our surprise, and that of the mechanic at the garage who, following a cursory look at our car, was astonished and gutted to find that, try as he might, he was unable to locate anything he could fail it on. As a treat we decided to splash out on a full service in celebration (and as compensation of sorts for the mechanic.) It looks like we can put off the search for a replacement car for another year.
But the Rover still has its problems. If I don’t drive it for around a week the battery goes flat, and so I am becoming a dab hand at dragging our less aged and more reliable Zafira over, jump-starting the Rover, and then fiddling with its remote key to get it to re-sync with the alarm, which usually entails removing the remote’s battery and faffing about a bit. Perhaps, then, I should still consider trading up to a newer, smarter, snazzier car, one more commensurate with my standing as Cheadle’s premier blogger†?
In the meantime, however, since jump-starting my car has become part of my regular routine, I decided to check that I was doing it correctly – I don’t especially want to electrocute myself, or set fire to one or both of my cars – and so I did a Google search to confirm what the approved technique is.
And I came across this from the Motoring pages of the Telegraph where Nick Comfort has the same problem as me, only to a greater degree. It is no consolation to find someone worse off than you are, and if you do have a second-rate vehicle inferior to my doughty Rover than you have my sympathy; but that is the situation Nick finds himself in, lumbered as he is with an Aston Martin DB7. Apparently
Many Astons have starting problems. Their electrical systems drain a 12-volt battery if left for more than a few days, and only the newest ones have a sleep mode. In four years of DB7 ownership I have got through three batteries.
I already had a trickle charger to plug into the cigarette lighter, which was fine except that I had to feed the lead through the window, which entailed leaving the alarm off. Aston Martin has now supplied a charger that feeds a socket in the boot and exits under the lid so the alarm can stay on.
Last winter, however, I was without this device and my Aston’s battery was flat just a day after a 200-mile run.
Now I’m pretty confident that even my knackered old banger would start first time under such circumstances, and this tale puts me in mind of a recent story a friend told me: that lately he had taken his Merc to a garage for a service and had been informed that the spark plugs had fused in place. A common enough problem, apparently; common, that is, on the Austin Healey and cars of a similar vintage, but a fault that had been rectified by most manufacturers since that time by utilising different metals, though not, it seems, by the good burghers at Mercedes-Benz. This problem was compounded by the fact that the spark plugs were conveniently located in such a position that only the complete removal of the engine would allow access to them, at an appropriate cost.
So while the grass may look greener on the other side of the troll bridge it can sometimes be better to stay put, and so I’ll take my Rover over an Aston Martin or a Mercedes for the time being. In any event, my car is a beautiful pearlescent purple colour, it would look even nicer if it ever got washed, probably, and it’s now my son’s favourite car since we got shot of our even more knackered Rover 420‡. Yes, I think I’ll stick with it; at least for as long as the rust still holds it together.
* Update: the garage has just called to tell me that they’ve found in the service that the brake discs and pads could do with replacing. That’ll learn me to be so smug.
† That is to say I’m the only one I know of.
‡ The loss of which he is still just coming to terms with, as is his idiosyncratic way.
Wednesday 11th June 2008
A Question Mark
I received a flurry of email newsflashes last week from Manchester City Football Club. First the shock news on Monday that Sven-Goran Eriksson and the club had “parted company by mutual consent,” then the follow-up formality on Tuesday that Hans Backe and Tord Grip had also left the club. The surprises continued on Wednesday when a third email informed me that “Manchester City & Sven-Goran Eriksson have parted company by mutual consent” (I think someone pressed the wrong button) before a further email 25 minutes later announced that “Mark Hughes has been confirmed as Manchester City’s new manager.” My final correspondence the following day announced that Hughes had just given a press conference, and then it all went quiet. It had been quite a half-week.
A lot has been said about the Sven situation, and I was obviously agin his dismissal, but I decided to keep my powder dry, for everything to be settled before I said my piece. Then, a 5th birthday party and a 6th wedding anniversary intervened, diverting me (in the nicest possible way) from finishing this rambling, overlong discourse, but here it is now anyway, for what it’s worth.
First of all, despite the current well-aired criticisms of the sacking (yes, sacking) of Sven, it is worth saying that when he arrived he was not universally welcomed. I don’t think there was much outright antagonism, but there were quite a few misgivings from many City fans bearing in mind his reputation as England manager. In the end there was generally a wait and see approach, accompanied with the back-handed compliment that Sven had a proven record as a “good club manager” (whatever that means) who had won trophies wherever he had been; a record that was bound to founder at Eastlands, regardless of how long he stayed there. I’d say I was happier than most at Sven’s appointment, primarily because I was less critical than most of his time at England, where I felt it was hardly his fault that his team failed to live up to the unrealistic expectation placed upon it (although there were plenty of errors during his time there that he can lay claim to and call his own.) As City kicked off the season at breakneck pace, seemingly invincible at home and pretty useful away, most reservations disappeared, and I was happy that we had undoubtedly improved upon the previous season’s shambles, but cautious that our results were exceeding the quality of our performances, and that something was likely to give at some point.
Before the start of last season there seemed less talk around about the purchase of the club by Thaksin Shinawatra. There were a few grumblings for sure, but amongst the fans the majority seemed not to care about his background or the fact that here was another moneybags owner who was going to skew the league ever more in the direction of the big spenders (indeed, that constituted most of his appeal), and this opinion didn’t seem to change over the course of the season; some even cheered his allies’ success in the Thai elections a few months ago as another feather in the cap for “Frank”. Personally I was extremely uncomfortable with his involvement, in part because of the allegations of corruption and human rights violations that hung around him, but also because I don’t like this trend towards ever deeper pockets buying success in football, even if it is currently our good fortune to be one of the beneficiaries. You will never get perfection I know, but I would prefer for us to be moving towards a situation where a club’s success was mainly down to appointing a canny manager who could handpick promising, talented players to blend a team that plays in the most entertaining way. I can’t tell you how much pleasure it gives me to go to the Premier League page on the BBC Sport website and double-take when I see a Hull City hyperlink staring back at me; but wouldn’t it be even better if we thought it possible that with a few key signings they could rise up the league and even challenge for the title in a few seasons time? Instead we know they will be fighting the drop until the day they are relegated, and it seems we are heading in the opposite direction to the way I would wish, ever further towards a league where the teams that succeed are purely the ones with the with the most pounds, dollars or bahts. You could argue that it is just this trend that has led us to the situation where the Premier League is the strongest domestic competition in Europe, but who benefits? Not the majority of fans I know who couldn’t care less what happened in this years’ European Cup final.
As last season began I had no interest in what happened to my team, genuinely feeling that the club I had supported since a boy was no more and that the team now playing in sky blue were a new club – Thaksin’s – bearing an historic name; interestingly that emotion is one I have heard a lot of other people express more recently. But when I saw Richard Dunne wearing one of those blue shirts on the first Match of the Day of the season such feelings disappeared in an instant, but my doubts about the direction the club would be going in didn’t. “Prove me wrong, Thaksin,” I thought to myself, and with Sven’s hasty and blinkered dismissal my worst fears seem to have been realised, although I won’t say I told you so (especially when stories like this show how ridiculous it is to lump all foreign / rich owner together as if they are inevitably as one.)
Let’s be honest though. Taking last season in isolation Thaksin’s involvement has hugely benefited the club. It was his money that brought Eriksson, Petrov, Corluka and Elano to Eastlands, without his involvement we would never have finished where we did in the league. We are not the first or only club to sack a manager prematurely – indeed City are past-masters at it – but few dismissals seem as out-and-out stupid as does Eriksson’s. So thanks for last season, Frank, but since I am intending to support City until I die I am also looking to the future, and that is where I am concerned. So what of the future, and how will this episode affect it?
For Sven the future looks bright; he’s not all that bothered by events I’m sure. He’s rehabilitated his battered reputation in England, received a tidy bit of compensation, and now has another new job to look forward. In all he’s probably better off out of Eastlands, he’s sorted. But what of the future of the other actors in this story?
On the playing side of the club, in the immediate future there is the fact that Richard Dunne, the rock of our defence, apparently wants away; how much has his desire to leave got to do with the sacking of Eriksson I wonder – how will other players react when their contracts are up for renewal – and how easy will it be to replace someone who currently seems so irreplaceable? He certainly won’t be replaced by paying silly money to Ronaldinho just because we can as has been mooted, a deal that, if it goes through, seems more comparable to the time Melchester Rovers signed Spandau Ballet’s Martin Kemp than to an incidence of a serious football club building a team to challenge for a trophy.
Before the appointment of Mark Hughes I worried about who would accept the job, and why. I have no axe to grind with Hughes, regardless of the identity of one of his previous employers, and he has a promising record as manager; but what chance that promise is given the time to further develop at City? The sacking of Eriksson itself suggests an impatient, short-termism from the owners of the club, and short-termism can breed a short-termists, mercenary strain of manager who will happily sign a three-year contract knowing that the worst thing that could happen is for him to be sacked mid-contract and to be paid off handsomely. I don’t want to malign Mark Hughes’s motivation, but if I were him and considering trading in the stability of Blackburn for the supposed risk at City it would be a no-brainer, win-win situation; he can sign on the dotted-line safe in the knowledge that in the unlikely event that he is given the time to succeed then all’s well, but no matter how badly he fucks it up and no matter how short his reign he will still get his pay-off and a ready-made excuse that his failure was down to his inability to work for Thaksin. Then he can still get a new job based on his unblemished Wales and Blackburn CV.
And finally, to Thaksin himself; what has this episode done to his reputation, and what does the future hold? Well the main thing that has happened is that many of those who weren’t interested in his background in Thailand before and didn’t care what effect a monied and dictatorial owner would have on the club in particular and football in general have changed their minds. Football fans can be a fickle lot, and no one will mourn Sven’s passing or brook criticism of Thaksin if the club goes from strength to strength from here on is. But I can’t help worrying about just how many managers we may have to go through – at a potentially diminishing rate of return – in the hope that one may fluke a bit of success in their first season; and if success doesn’t come, how long before Thaksin becomes bored, loses interest, packs up and moves on? And if that does happen, where will City be then?
The Obscurer 