The Obscurer

A long, long time ago, before it began to be written by/for chimps, I used to watch The Bill. Most episodes would feature a police officer interviewing a suspect, and try as they might the writers found that there was only so much variety they could put into such scenes. If I had bothered to keep score then I would have lost count of the number of times the suspect would break down and confess along the lines of “Alright; I did it, I stabbed her to death in the kitchen. But you weren’t there! You don’t know what it was like, the way she kept taunting me! I had to do it; any man would have done the same!”; at which point awkward glances are exchanged between the interviewing officers and the murderer’s solicitor, each thinking “err, oh no we wouldn’t”.

I have been reminded of such storylines while listening to a parade of people on television and radio excusing Israel from using a sledgehammer – or rocket – to crack a nut in dealing with the attacks currently emanating from Lebanon. Israel, it appears, has no option but to react in the way it has in the face of Hizbullah’s aggression, and any country would have acted in the same fashion. I find it an unconvincing line myself. It is not that I believe Israel doesn’t have a clear right to respond, but I do question the severity of that response.

What I have thought interesting, when I have read the usual suspects complaining about the media’s coverage of the situation and their alleged bias, for example questioning the nature of Israel’s response, is that while we have seen many people defend Israel’s actions I personally have not seen a single person seek to excuse Hizbullah; but I don’t find this surprising. I think it goes without saying that any right-minded person condemns Hizbullah and their continued assaults upon Israel and its citizens. You would think the same would go for Israel’s acts, but apparently not. If people such as Melanie Phillips are astonished that Israel keeps getting criticised, perhaps she should reflect that it is because of apologists such as her that what should go without saying needs having to be said, over and over again, in the hope that it might finally sink in.

Where do we go from here? If Israel thinks that bombing the innocent in Lebanon will make them see the light and turn against Hizbullah, then history tends to suggest the opposite reaction. Melanie Phillips, again, in this article, tackles those who complain of Israel’s “disproportionate response” by stating that it is “no more ‘disproportionate’ than, for example NATO’s bombing of civilian targets in Serbia to force it to withdraw from Kosovo.” But apart from the fact that, a) although I am in the minority on this I personally do believe that NATO’s response there was disproportionate (it is a long story why, certainly another post for another day; suffice it to say that I think there could have been a peaceful resolution to the situation) and b) in over-reacting to acts of terrorism I would say Israel more resembles Serbia than NATO, the bombing of Belgrade during the Kosovo conflict had the immediate effect of uniting pretty much all Serb’s, both pro- and anti- Milosevic, against NATO. Israel will be casting a similar spell now in Lebanon; their response is surely doomed to failure.

I am no expert on the geo-political situation in the Middle East, as I think I have just proven; but you have to wonder what Hizbullah’s game plan is, and I would hope that Israel does too. If we take it as read – I have no reason to doubt it – that Iran and/or Syria are behind all this, then you have to imagine that launching rockets into Haifa and killing and kidnapping Israeli soldiers is not in itself going to drive Israel into the sea; the intention must be to provoke a response from Israel which would lead to even greater instability in the region. If so then Israel has reacted in a predictable and depressing manner. I’m speculating, of course; but if I’m right then the harsher Israel reacts, with their cheerleaders in the media justifying each attack regardless of its consequences, then the more they are falling in with their enemies’ plans.

The blogosphere is choc-a-bloc with disillusioned Labour supporters, disheartened by what they see as Tony Blair’s betrayals once he gained power, presiding over a government that tramples on many of our cherished ideals.

But I’m not one of them, not really. For one thing I’ve never been a Labour voter; but for another Blair was elected back in 1997 with a manifesto and billboard campaign boasting of how he would stick to the Tories’ taxing and spending commitments, so I never expected Labour in office to be any different from the preceding rabble. As such, in the early days of the administration I actually sought to defend Blair, after a fashion. To those on the “left” dismayed by Labour’s antics I said, “well what did you expect, he promised nothing and he has delivered”. To his critics on the “right” I just wondered what their problem was; I don’t know what more Blair could have done to satisfy them, short of actually joining the Conservative party.

So I expected nowt from Labour in 1997; but that bright morning after their election victory I clearly remember reading Ceefax (ah, those were the days) when a small story caught my eye claiming that the new government would launch an investigation into Gulf War syndrome. Perhaps I have been too cynical and pessimistic about New Labour, I thought. Early days indeed, but they had already done something that the Tories would never have countenanced. Maybe it would be all right.

So for me it was especially depressing to read this article in The Guardian, about how the MoD had to be dragged into accepting Gulf War syndrome by the pensions appeal tribunal only last November, and that it has since rowed back from that position by unilaterally reinterpreting its conclusions in order to save money. The report states that

Last month, Mr Concannon (the president of the tribunal) wrote to Alan Burnham, chief executive of the Veterans Agency, in unusually strong language. He said: “The Ministry of Defence have clearly and deliberately departed from the terms of the tribunal decision in order to substitute their own expression. In my view the Ministry of Defence have no legal authority to tamper with the terms on which a tribunal allows an appeal. The Ministry of Defence have taken on themselves to manipulate the terms of the tribunal’s decision.

“What they have done is a purely unilateral decision. It is a decision that at least questions and probably undermines any confidence the tribunal might have that its decisions will be faithfully implemented.”

Labour’s former minister for the disabled, Lord Morris, told the Guardian: “The Ministry of Defence has effectively overturned the tribunal’s decision. This could affect hundreds, if not thousands of servicemen who are suffering from Gulf war syndrome. This could stop them getting additional money.”

Last Thursday, the National Gulf Veterans and Families Association wrote to Lord Craig of Radley, the former Air Chief Marshall at the time of the first Gulf War, to highlight the MoD’s change of heart. The association accused the MoD of playing “another sleight of hand”.

Last night the MoD said it would not accept the existence of Gulf war syndrome. The ministry said money was already being paid to ex-servicemen with disabilities, and that it did not need to pay extra money for those who claimed they were suffering from Gulf war syndrome.

This government has done many things to appal; even though I expected little of them they have still shocked me in many of their actions. But this decision feels more personal; it brings me right back to Labour’s first day in power, when a jaundiced and slimmer future blogger briefly thought things could be just a little bit better.

This is where I came in; cynicism restored and intact.

This fine weather’s not really conducive to blogging is it? And judging by the lack of recent updates on some of the other blogs I read I am not alone in that opinion. As predicted, The Obscurer’s rebirth on its own domain has been a bit akin to a toe-stubbing false start due to my general busyness, but in particular I have spent the past few days tipping cash into the pockets of assorted Premier Travel Inns, and swelling the coffers of various hostelries in Llandudno, Betws-Y-Coed and Manchester.

On my travels, however, I couldn’t help but notice that David Cameron has declared a truce between the Conservative party and the public sector, and I thought this would be worthy of a post. Regular readers, or at least regular readers who have paid attention, will know that I work in the public sector, and have written a few posts in its defence. So I resolved to return to the subject on my return home.

The gist was going to be that that you would expect me to cheer a speech by Cameron on the virtues of the public services, when many comments on the subject seem to tar all public sector workers with the same “lazy and inefficient” brush. In fact I was going to say that assuming that public sector workers are more caring and dedicated than their private sector counterparts, that they have a more vocational ethos, is every bit at stupid as suggesting we are all bone idle. I was going to say that public sector workers are not a breed apart from private sector workers; that most of us have worked in the private sector at some point and haven’t become either lazier or more caring just because our employer has changed. I would have gone on to say that personally I didn’t so much choose to work in the public sector as choose to do a job which just happened to be in the public sector, and that many of my colleagues feel the same way. I hope I have always done my job to the besy of my ability regardless of where my wages have come from. Just because Cameron has now made a flattering generalisation about the public sector doesn’t make it any less silly for all that.

But then, when I did get home and looked at David Cameron’s speech I realised that he didn’t actually say anything of any substance, and so there wasn’t anything to criticise or applaud in the first place; and so it was that the main purpose of this post came a cropper. Never mind. However, if Cameron thought that holding out an olive branch to this public sector worker would make me more likely to vote for him (and vote grabbing was surely his main motivation) then he is very much mistaken; although he is probably onto a loser with me anyway. I dutifully promise, however, that the moment his party actually comes up with something even vaguely resembling a policy then I will consider it in full; but I think we may well be in for a long wait.