Its not stretching the truth, to say I am not Vince Cable biggest fan, from his soaking the rich strategy, to flip-flopping on all the major issues, to being the architect behind the capital gains tax rise, Vince cable has been in my view on the wrong side of the political debate.
So today it is good for him to realise and talk about public sector pay cuts saying it is necessary from top to bottom, as well as more transparency in whitehall so we the public can see what we are paying for and whether they are worth it. In these areas it is a good start from the coalition from cameron's attack on the ludicrous pay packets for the civil servants, to pickles tackling of the quangos and local government executive pay- unlike Labour the coalition seems to realise that public sector pay has been over the top and needs to be constrained.
to read a good post on Cable's common sense approach -which hopefully he will follow through on, on public sector pay and comparing it to Labour's disastrous public sector pay policy please go to http://networkedblogs.com/4rXBI- it comes from the freedom association
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Why the international media and governments got it wrong on the Gaza Flotilla
There is an excellent post by Alistaire De Kare Silver from the centre for social cohesion, on why rather than blaming Israel, everyone needs to look at who is really to blame for all of this and the suffering of the palestinian people - namely Hamas.
http://www.socialcohesion.co.uk/blog/2010/06/humanitarian-aid-or-political-agenda.html
heres the excellent post I urge you to read it.
http://www.socialcohesion.co.uk/blog/2010/06/humanitarian-aid-or-political-agenda.html
heres the excellent post I urge you to read it.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Why There Is A Blockade on the Gaza Strip
it needs to remembered why their is a partial blockade on Gaza. In a perfect world both Israel and Egypt wished they wouldn't have to enact a blockade on Gaza but unfortunately we do not live in a perfect world. It must be remember since Israel left the Gaza Strip in 2005 with hopes of peace, in return it received more than 10,000 rockets and terrorist attacks.
Constantly when Israel has opened the borders in Gaza, rather than food and fuel going in, which may be needed, Hamas instead, showing that in reality it couldn't give two figs about the palestinian people, smuggles weapons in, all sorts of ammmunition, and has even been known to hide in sugar packets ammonium nitrae,and also uses building materials such as pipes to use in mortar bombs and rockets. Therefore the whole point of the blockade, jointly carried out by Israel and Egypt I must add, although strangely enough you do not hear much condemnation of Egypt, is there to stop attacks on Israeli Civilians, it is there to weaken a terorist movement in Hamas. If Hamas stopped trying to smuggle in weapons to attack Israeli civilians there would be no need for the blockade and Israel would stop it.
Additionally it is important to remember that it is only a partial blockade, Israel still provides at least by conservative estimates about 15,000 tons of supplies and humanitarian aid every week to the people of Gaza. Not only this but there are often even in times of war, treatment of gaza civilians in Israeli Hospitals, hardly the actions of a callous government. Indeed to prove this Israel has said that it will deliver any humanitarian aid to Gaza, as it does daily. This has all meant that since the ceasefire in January 2009 well over a million tons of humanitarian supplies entered Gaza from Israel. That is almost a ton of aid for each man, woman and child in the Strip. Indeed Israel even offered to help the Gaza Flotilla with its goods through offering to accommodate them in any way possible, and deliver the donated goods through Ashdod, using normal search procedures. The activists rejected the offer. Clearly petty political games, are more important than aid to Gaza.
Due to the obvious tight security checks about anything coming into Gaza any illegal entry of a vessel into waters, would be checked and this was indeed what Israel intended to do, again as all part of the security measures they have had to initiate thanks to Hamas. If the flotilla was peaceful they would have been fine, but as highlighted in my previous post they were not.
Its also important to note as highlighted by Tom Gross that everything you hear about the blockade and the continued lack of goods in Gaza may be stretching to this-to learn about this go to http://www.tomgrossmedia.com/mideastdispatches/archives/001114.html.
Constantly when Israel has opened the borders in Gaza, rather than food and fuel going in, which may be needed, Hamas instead, showing that in reality it couldn't give two figs about the palestinian people, smuggles weapons in, all sorts of ammmunition, and has even been known to hide in sugar packets ammonium nitrae,and also uses building materials such as pipes to use in mortar bombs and rockets. Therefore the whole point of the blockade, jointly carried out by Israel and Egypt I must add, although strangely enough you do not hear much condemnation of Egypt, is there to stop attacks on Israeli Civilians, it is there to weaken a terorist movement in Hamas. If Hamas stopped trying to smuggle in weapons to attack Israeli civilians there would be no need for the blockade and Israel would stop it.
Additionally it is important to remember that it is only a partial blockade, Israel still provides at least by conservative estimates about 15,000 tons of supplies and humanitarian aid every week to the people of Gaza. Not only this but there are often even in times of war, treatment of gaza civilians in Israeli Hospitals, hardly the actions of a callous government. Indeed to prove this Israel has said that it will deliver any humanitarian aid to Gaza, as it does daily. This has all meant that since the ceasefire in January 2009 well over a million tons of humanitarian supplies entered Gaza from Israel. That is almost a ton of aid for each man, woman and child in the Strip. Indeed Israel even offered to help the Gaza Flotilla with its goods through offering to accommodate them in any way possible, and deliver the donated goods through Ashdod, using normal search procedures. The activists rejected the offer. Clearly petty political games, are more important than aid to Gaza.
Due to the obvious tight security checks about anything coming into Gaza any illegal entry of a vessel into waters, would be checked and this was indeed what Israel intended to do, again as all part of the security measures they have had to initiate thanks to Hamas. If the flotilla was peaceful they would have been fine, but as highlighted in my previous post they were not.
Its also important to note as highlighted by Tom Gross that everything you hear about the blockade and the continued lack of goods in Gaza may be stretching to this-to learn about this go to http://www.tomgrossmedia.com/mideastdispatches/archives/001114.html.
the truth about the gaza flotilla and why it got attacked.
Unfortunately yesterday morning in the early morning at least 10 israeli soldiers were wounded, and 10 violent protestors on the free gaza boat were killed.
If you listened to the media, or indeed politicians from across the world, this is all Israel's fault and only Israel is in the wrong. If you wanted to highlighted how bias the media is against Israel, there reporting of this incident, without a semblance of even trying to look at both sides of the arguments highlights this.
It needs to be remembered that this boat, far from containing a load of peaceful but nutty leftwing protestors, is not the case. If this was the case they would not have initiated the figting against Israel, or indeed attacked members of the Israeli Army. Like any nation Israel through its army has the right to defend itself and this needs to be remembered. When an army is attacked it has to respond and this is what the Israeli Army, did, there needed to be no bloodshed and no casualties if the Israeli army hadn't been attacked with knifes and guns on the boat. Israel did not want this after all the transport minister from the Labour Pary Binyamnin Ben-Eliezer said on behalf of Israeli government said we certainly regret the loss of life. Looking at it from this angle, the protestors don't seem to be the peaceful angels they are being portrayed as. In all of this Mark Regev the Israeli Spokesman was right to say that Unfortunately this group were dead-set on confrontation," Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev told the BBC. "Live fire was used against our forces. They initiated the violence, that's 100% clear," he said.
Secondly my suspcicions were raised when it said one of the protestors seriously wounded, was a senior member of the Islamic Movement Raed Saleh, the Islamic Movement by any counts is an islamic extremist organisation with links to terrorism, they get much of its support from the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is one of its offshoots, this group is constantly trying to enflame tensions between jews and muslims in Jerusalem as well as constantly producing anti-semitic bile. The so-called idea of peaceful protestors for me goes out of the window, when you have members of a terrorist group onboard. Additionally the turkish government's involvement need to be looked at as a writer for MidEast on target, Yisrael Neeman was right to say that "Erdogan is outwardly supporting Hamas over Fatah. Had he supported the PA and Fatah he would have shipped all the humanitarian equipment to them and had Fatah take the credit for its distribution. Instead he decided on a clash with Israel using his own Turkish Muslim Brotherhood supporters from the IHH (the so-called relief agency with reported ties to Islamic terror organizations) in an effort to undermine those in a state of peace with Israel and the Fatah led PA who presently are attempting to arrive at a two state solution with the Jewish State. It is just another example of the turkish government's involvement in the last couple of years with islamic extremists.
The protestors were not peaceful, they contained members with strong links with Islamic Extremist groups, by their actions they did nothing to help the people of Gaza, and they caused the attack on the boat.
If you listened to the media, or indeed politicians from across the world, this is all Israel's fault and only Israel is in the wrong. If you wanted to highlighted how bias the media is against Israel, there reporting of this incident, without a semblance of even trying to look at both sides of the arguments highlights this.
It needs to be remembered that this boat, far from containing a load of peaceful but nutty leftwing protestors, is not the case. If this was the case they would not have initiated the figting against Israel, or indeed attacked members of the Israeli Army. Like any nation Israel through its army has the right to defend itself and this needs to be remembered. When an army is attacked it has to respond and this is what the Israeli Army, did, there needed to be no bloodshed and no casualties if the Israeli army hadn't been attacked with knifes and guns on the boat. Israel did not want this after all the transport minister from the Labour Pary Binyamnin Ben-Eliezer said on behalf of Israeli government said we certainly regret the loss of life. Looking at it from this angle, the protestors don't seem to be the peaceful angels they are being portrayed as. In all of this Mark Regev the Israeli Spokesman was right to say that Unfortunately this group were dead-set on confrontation," Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev told the BBC. "Live fire was used against our forces. They initiated the violence, that's 100% clear," he said.
Secondly my suspcicions were raised when it said one of the protestors seriously wounded, was a senior member of the Islamic Movement Raed Saleh, the Islamic Movement by any counts is an islamic extremist organisation with links to terrorism, they get much of its support from the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is one of its offshoots, this group is constantly trying to enflame tensions between jews and muslims in Jerusalem as well as constantly producing anti-semitic bile. The so-called idea of peaceful protestors for me goes out of the window, when you have members of a terrorist group onboard. Additionally the turkish government's involvement need to be looked at as a writer for MidEast on target, Yisrael Neeman was right to say that "Erdogan is outwardly supporting Hamas over Fatah. Had he supported the PA and Fatah he would have shipped all the humanitarian equipment to them and had Fatah take the credit for its distribution. Instead he decided on a clash with Israel using his own Turkish Muslim Brotherhood supporters from the IHH (the so-called relief agency with reported ties to Islamic terror organizations) in an effort to undermine those in a state of peace with Israel and the Fatah led PA who presently are attempting to arrive at a two state solution with the Jewish State. It is just another example of the turkish government's involvement in the last couple of years with islamic extremists.
The protestors were not peaceful, they contained members with strong links with Islamic Extremist groups, by their actions they did nothing to help the people of Gaza, and they caused the attack on the boat.
the telegraph claims its first scalp in the honourable David Laws
The hounding of david laws by the telegraph is disgraceful
no.1 - the implications on his sexuality have nothing to do with them. he should be allowed to have a private life,I could not care if he is gay, straight or bi-sexual -white, black, muslim, asian or jew or whatever religion or nationality or indeed no religion, as long as he has the qualities and expertise to be good at his job that he clearly did. Yet the telegraph seemed to make this the crux of his story - clearly David Laws wanted to keep his relationship private he didn't even tell his family, he should have been allowed to do. Also he did not have a conventional relationship like some partners they were not joined by the hip and they had separate bank accounts and there own lives- why again the telegraph made a big deal out of this is beyond me unless of course they want to wreck the coalition and couldn't care about reporting well informed news.
no. 2- he has acknowledged his mistakes, referred himself to the parliamentary commissioner and is already repaying the full amount, showing his humility a degree of class and what a genuine bloke he is. This quality for me shines through, when you compare him to many in the expenses scandal, much worse than him such as for example the odious Elliot Morley or Julie Kirkbride who were not willing to own up to their mistakes or resign until pushed. I'm not saying what David Laws did was right, but he has acknowledged it and his claims were not terrible. Not only this, maybe it will make us realise that Politicians are human beings with all their frailties too, something the expenses scandal -which in my opinion is now being mightily overblown by the telegraph, to try and paint every politician as a crook seem to forget. Yes there were some bad eggs and the telegraph was right to expose them, but the telegraph has gone and hounded to far, acting more like a salacious tabloid, then a quality broadsheet.
no.3- David Laws has started excellently at his job, being honest with the people about the scale of cuts. In the 17 days of the job, he showed up Liam byrne for the fool he was, with his disgusting note to him, and did more than his labour counterpart did in three years. When he spoke to the house of commons, his delivery was masterful and was better i must admit then a lot on the frontbench. you only have to hear his great response to a Labour question, saying that we have a different view to labour and dont believe that the state is always right and should always be involved and we want to devolve power to communities and the localities - to understand that for him this is what held true -just as the coalition thought. He also was ready to take a scalpel to public spending, cutting the neccessary waste, and the plans he set out were credible to do this. As someone who has always been on the right of the liberal democrats as his involvement with the right wing orange book club within the Libdems shown, he was never one of the slippers and sandals brigades on the Liberal Democrats, in fact two years ago we tried to get him to join the Conservatives but he honourably said no. As the Shadow liberal democrat education spokesman, he helped formulate the excellent pupil's premium ideas, as well as supporting the idea of free schools - on the basis of Sweden. Laws was a reformer who thought radically and I truly think the coalition will be worse for losing him. I look forward to his intelligent interventions on the backbenches in support of the coalition,and hope to see him back on the frontbenches soon - the coalition certainly could do a lot worse.
The telegraph on the other hand, once a fine newspaper, is not simply reporting the news anymore it is trying to make it. Not only have they apart from the odd article from Boris Johnson, written nothing but negative dribble about the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, rather than having a nuanced perspective looking at both sides of the argument, they have also in the past offered nothing but negativity about David Cameron. I have no problem with this but for a quality newspaper they have to at least have a semblance of showing both sides of the arguments,as well as not blowing the expenses scandal out of all proportion like they did. From now on in I will not consider buying the telegraph or reading it online until this is sorted out.
so my two messages are good luck to laws, and sort yourself out telegraph.
no.1 - the implications on his sexuality have nothing to do with them. he should be allowed to have a private life,I could not care if he is gay, straight or bi-sexual -white, black, muslim, asian or jew or whatever religion or nationality or indeed no religion, as long as he has the qualities and expertise to be good at his job that he clearly did. Yet the telegraph seemed to make this the crux of his story - clearly David Laws wanted to keep his relationship private he didn't even tell his family, he should have been allowed to do. Also he did not have a conventional relationship like some partners they were not joined by the hip and they had separate bank accounts and there own lives- why again the telegraph made a big deal out of this is beyond me unless of course they want to wreck the coalition and couldn't care about reporting well informed news.
no. 2- he has acknowledged his mistakes, referred himself to the parliamentary commissioner and is already repaying the full amount, showing his humility a degree of class and what a genuine bloke he is. This quality for me shines through, when you compare him to many in the expenses scandal, much worse than him such as for example the odious Elliot Morley or Julie Kirkbride who were not willing to own up to their mistakes or resign until pushed. I'm not saying what David Laws did was right, but he has acknowledged it and his claims were not terrible. Not only this, maybe it will make us realise that Politicians are human beings with all their frailties too, something the expenses scandal -which in my opinion is now being mightily overblown by the telegraph, to try and paint every politician as a crook seem to forget. Yes there were some bad eggs and the telegraph was right to expose them, but the telegraph has gone and hounded to far, acting more like a salacious tabloid, then a quality broadsheet.
no.3- David Laws has started excellently at his job, being honest with the people about the scale of cuts. In the 17 days of the job, he showed up Liam byrne for the fool he was, with his disgusting note to him, and did more than his labour counterpart did in three years. When he spoke to the house of commons, his delivery was masterful and was better i must admit then a lot on the frontbench. you only have to hear his great response to a Labour question, saying that we have a different view to labour and dont believe that the state is always right and should always be involved and we want to devolve power to communities and the localities - to understand that for him this is what held true -just as the coalition thought. He also was ready to take a scalpel to public spending, cutting the neccessary waste, and the plans he set out were credible to do this. As someone who has always been on the right of the liberal democrats as his involvement with the right wing orange book club within the Libdems shown, he was never one of the slippers and sandals brigades on the Liberal Democrats, in fact two years ago we tried to get him to join the Conservatives but he honourably said no. As the Shadow liberal democrat education spokesman, he helped formulate the excellent pupil's premium ideas, as well as supporting the idea of free schools - on the basis of Sweden. Laws was a reformer who thought radically and I truly think the coalition will be worse for losing him. I look forward to his intelligent interventions on the backbenches in support of the coalition,and hope to see him back on the frontbenches soon - the coalition certainly could do a lot worse.
The telegraph on the other hand, once a fine newspaper, is not simply reporting the news anymore it is trying to make it. Not only have they apart from the odd article from Boris Johnson, written nothing but negative dribble about the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, rather than having a nuanced perspective looking at both sides of the argument, they have also in the past offered nothing but negativity about David Cameron. I have no problem with this but for a quality newspaper they have to at least have a semblance of showing both sides of the arguments,as well as not blowing the expenses scandal out of all proportion like they did. From now on in I will not consider buying the telegraph or reading it online until this is sorted out.
so my two messages are good luck to laws, and sort yourself out telegraph.
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