The Yorkshire Evening Post and New Labour
Two recent stories in the Yorkshire Evening Post refer to Leeds Chapel Allerton Councillors. On both occasions the YEP chose not to give the full background to its readers. The stories are related and concern the shortage of women in the Leeds New Labour Party.
Come on Eileen; time's up
Councillor Eileen Moxon has been the most active, and on local issues the most visible, Chapel Allerton Councillor. She has also been loyal to the New Labour project, never once voting in the Council Chamber with the rebels led by Patrick Hall. However just like Patrick, Eileen was excluded from the approved list of New Labour candidates. The reasons for this were a bit hazy. Eileen, being a feisty feminist, objected so strongly that she delayed New Labour's selection process by a couple of months.
So the fulsome praise Keith Wakefield, Leeds Council Leader, had for Eileen and her statement that she intends to spend more time on special projects and her extended family doesn't quite ring true. I, of course, wish her well in her new ventures.
One consequence of excluding Eileen from the list of candidates was that there were no longer enough women to go round. This is because this year in Leeds there has been a reorganisation of the ward boundaries. This means for each of the 33 wards New Labour will have to find three candidates, 99 in all. So rather than put Eileen or any more women on to the approved list, New Labour came up with a formula to share them out across the city, without challenging any sitting male Labour councillors.
The formula meant that Chapel Allerton ward had to select one male candidate and two female candidates. A male carpetbagger from Roundhay, who had failed to work out he was going to be living in one of the safest New Labour wards in the City, made a big push to gain the nomination for the much less safe Chapel Allerton. He succeeded. Councillor Taggart's friends in the area warned him. However rather than rallying his supporters, Taggart relied on the prestige of being Lord Mayor. He was decisively beaten.
Taggart, Lord Lucan or Reservoir Dog?
According to the YEP he is hoping that there is some ward in the city who have not heard about his lack of attendance to local matters and are impressed enough with his fancy Lord Mayor's costume to select him.
It would be wrong to think that Lord Mayor Taggart doesn't take any notice of what is happening. After he read my comments about him not attending the celebrations of the 100th anniversary of Chapel Allerton Library, he has changed his mind and is now coming on the 28th of January. We hope to publish a picture so that local residents will be able to recognise him and not confuse him with Lord Lucan.
Survivors
My energetic friend Garth Frankland visited the Anne Frank exhibition at Trinity and All Saints College. His old British Library boss John Chillag gave a moving and dispassionate talk on his treatment in the hands of the Nazis during the Second World War. His Jewish family was moved from Hungary to Auschwitz in March 1944. 35 members of his family were sent to the gas chambers there. John and his father were sent to do slave labour at an engineering factory at Bochum. There his father died. When the allies reached the Ruhr he was moved to Buchenwald. By then his weight was down to four stone. He was placed in the infirmary which was next to the crematorium. The Americans liberated the camp in time to save his life. He kept going because by the time he was picked up it was obvious the Nazis were losing the war.
John Chillag's account of his experience along with others are contained in the book Survival: Holocaust Survivors tell their story. Edited by Wendy Whitworth, Quill Press, ISBN 0-9543001-1-04.
John Chillag linked his story with what is happening in the world today and asked everyone to not forget the Holocaust and to learn its lessons.
News from America
George Bush's Texas
It sometimes can be forgotten what a peculiar place George Bush's Texas is. These two little stories help to remind us.
Bush's administration, and before that in his home state of Texas, have pushed hard to eliminate affirmative action programmes which have increased the number of blacks at university. A policy initiative that David Lamy, New Labour Minister for Constitutional Affairs, conveniently missed out in his comparison of African Carribbeans at UK and US Universities in a recent Guardian article. He also seemed to think that they all live in London. There are currently more male blacks in jail in the US than at university, a figure the UK is very close to. However some programmes to get people into university have escaped Bush. These are the legacy points that allow relatives of graduates to have extra points on their application form so getting above people who are better qualified. At the prestigious Texas A&M these extra points allowed in 2003 312 whites to gain entry compared with six blacks and 27 Hispanics. The 312 was nearly equal to the total of blacks who were admitted.
On top of this the police spend their time chasing people who sell vibrators. A Texas housewife is in big trouble with the law for selling a vibrator to a pair of undercover cops, and the Brisbane vibrator company she works for says Texas is an "antiquated place" with more than its share of "prudes." The company's merchandise is offered for sale in private, Tupperware-style parties to women who may be reluctant to visit an adult novelty store. Perhaps the Queen makes the occasional purchase but not in Texas where you might have to spend a year in jail. The arrested lady said she was amazed that the town's narcotics squad had been put on the case. "We have a real problem with drugs in our schools,'' she said, "and they're using our narcotics officers to entrap me for selling a vibrator.''
If it had a "shoot to kill" setting, it would have been legal.
Free speech in the US
President Bush has never spent much time running the US government. He leaves that to his closest advisors and market forces, usually both. However he does spend a considerable amount of time touring the country. As the presidential election approaches he is increasing the amount of time he spends on the road. In order to ensure his safety the Secret service go on ahead to prepare the ground. However they do more for him. They instruct local police to set up "free speech" zones well away from presidential and more importantly press sight. Into these zones all protesters are corralled. Anyone protesting outside of these zones is routinely arrested and charged.
This has been challenged in the courts. A retired steelworker, Bill Neel, was arrested for carrying a sign outside of the designated area saying: "The Bush family must surely love the poor, they made so many of us." However the local judge throw out the charge and defended the right to protest. However this has not stopped the Bush administration. They are now prosecuting Brett Bursey, who was arrested for holding a "No War for Oil" sign at a Bush visit to Columbia, S.C. He too had refused to move to the "free-speech zone". If convicted, Bursey faces six months in jail and a $5,000 fine. The Federal Magistrate has denied Bursey's request for a jury trial because his violation is categorised as a petty offence. His lawyers sought the Secret Service documents they believed would lay out the official policies on restricting critical speech at presidential visits. The Bush administration sought to block all access to the documents, but Federal Magistrate ruled that the lawyers could have limited access.
These are not isolated events. People have been arrested in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Michigan, New Jersey, New Mexico and Texas. Attempts to suppress protesters become more disturbing in the light of the Homeland Security Department's recommendation that local police departments view critics of the war on terrorism as potential terrorists. In a May terrorist advisory, the Homeland Security Department warned local law enforcement agencies to keep an eye on anyone who "expressed dislike of attitudes and decisions of the US government."
One of the most violent government responses to an antiwar protest occurred when local police and the federally funded California Anti-Terrorism Task Force fired rubber bullets and tear gas at peaceful protesters and innocent bystanders at the Port of Oakland, injuring a number of people. When the police attack sparked a wave of criticism, Mike van Winkle, the spokesman for the California Anti-Terrorism Information Center told the Oakland Tribune, "You can make an easy kind of a link that, if you have a protest group protesting a war where the cause that's being fought against is international terrorism, you might have terrorism at that protest. You can almost argue that a protest against that is a terrorist act."
Van Winkle justified classifying protesters as terrorists: "I've heard terrorism described as anything that is violent or has an economic impact, and shutting down a port certainly would have some economic impact. Terrorism isn't just bombs going off and killing people."
Stopping the terrorists from America
The recent decision by the Government of Brazil to photo and fingerprint all visitors from the US gives our own government a lead to follow (and no jokes about poodles). The recent murder of a police officer in Leeds by a US citizen on the run could have been prevented by such measures. In my last Umbrella I drew attention to extremist right wing groups manufacturing weapons of mass destruction in the US, the only place that the legal process has confirmed the existence of such weapons. One of the main tenets of faith of these US groups is that the US is controlled by secret cabals involving our beloved Queen and the UK establishment. Sometimes this belief is combined with rabid anti-Semitism. There is therefore for good reasons to carefully check on those US citizens who come over here. We could start by having carefully checking the background of a certain Murdoch who seems to have an unhealthy influence over our present government.
Stuart Bruce and the devil
I've previously drawn attention to the Blog of Leeds Middleton Councillor Stuart Bruce. His irregular unthinking New Labour musings provide a good insight into the Blairite clones' lives.
As I said before it is really impossible to parody his writing. The extracts below show his preoccupation with the devil who as we all know lives in Middleton Lake.
The 27 November entry on Housing gives his thoughts on Alan Milburn's new bill which aims to curb council house sales and to encourage home ownership. Councillor Bruce has an ambiguous position on council house sales, however he does support:
The proposals on licensing private landlords and HMOs (houses in multiple occupation) are particularly welcome but the devil will be in the detail.
He also shows his class position as lapdog of the toffs with the following quote:
It is a coherent and well thought out package of legislation and I also welcome the fact that there were no proposals to waste valuable Parliamentary time on fox hunting. A Labour government should be spending time on issues that really make a difference to peoples' lives instead of pandering to a vocal minority of ill-informed animal rights activists and class warriors.
A couple of weeks later he returns to the reactionary New Labour Agenda gently supporting top-up fees for university students. However he returns to his obsession with the devil:
But I think the devil is in the detail and it is right to have a debate about exactly what we mean by top-up fees. It also needs to be 'sold' in a much better way. The whole idea of talking about loans is wrong and will act as a major disincentive for many working class young people worried about the idea of such a large debt. Instead we should be talking about encouraging people to invest in their future careers. People are quite happy to take on debts of £40,000 to £100,000+ that take 25 years to pay off. But these are called mortgages and are for investing in a home. We should be thinking of career mortgages that provide long-term.
His PR training shows through. Let's spin the message from the real debt to possible future benefits. And of course take the investment away from the country to the individual. This is clear exposition of the Blairite support for the key element of the Thatcher philosophy that society doesn't exist, only the individual. Once university education becomes an individual investment the country will be overrun by accountants, lawyers and unfortunately PR executives. Engineers, scientists, teachers and health professionals will be in short supply. This is the nightmare of the New Labour future. The devil really is in the detail.
Snippets
Chapel Allerton Public Library Centennial
Harrogate Road, Leeds. 100th year celebrations on Wednesday 28th January. It is however being closed for refurbishment from 13th January until 23rd January.
Green Fair
Hilary Wainright opening the Green Fair
I forgot to report on the Leeds Alliance for Socialism's Green Fair in my last Umbrella. Needless to say it was very successful with over 140 people attending. The famous Red Pepper editor Hilary Wainwright ably opened it. There were a dozen stalls including Yorkshire CND, Green Burials and Love Organic.
Tackling the vulnerable and weak
Leeds' New Labour Group has made a great issue of using Anti Social Behaviour legislation to attack the poor and vulnerable. It doesn't do anything to attack those white-collar criminals who have destroyed the pension funds of thousands in Leeds. Its latest ploy has been to target beggars in the centre of Leeds. It has plastered lampposts with stickers calling on people not give any money. It perpetuates the old Elizabethan myth of "robust and sturdy beggars". This drive has not been linked to any new initiatives to improve the lot of those who end up sleeping rough. And of course the logic of Anti Working Class Behaviour Orders is followed through by Blunkett in trying to use them to force poor parents to pay more for their family holidays.
Of course it is impossible to believe anything illegal ever happens in Leeds City centre. Last October Bill Brown of New York Surveillance checked out the number in the central area. He found 153 cameras. There is 16 square blocks in the centre and so there are nearly 10 cameras per block. This compares with similar areas in New York and Chicago of only 7 per block. They are now backed up the police video vans. Any local authority which really cared about its citizens would be investigating this gross invasion of privacy.
The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers
The IEEE, the large US based technical organisation but with tens of thousands of members across the globe, has banned any resident of Cuba, Iran, Libya, and Sudan from contributing to any of its journals or conference proceedings. Researchers from Iran, in particular, submit dozens of research papers every year.
We heard the screams from the Blairites and the Daily Telegraph over the proposed boycott of the rogue nuclear state of Israel but there has been deafening silence on this boycott.
-- Half-Celestial Khan
