Julie Bindel and Stonewall

There has been quite an outcry over the decision of the nominating committee at Stonewall (who is on the committee - any insight?) to shortlist Julie Bindel as Journalist of the Year. She is one of a , thankfully, dying and outdated breed of antiquated 'radical' feminists - I use the word in inverted commas as they are in fact deeply conservative and reactionary. Her obsessions are: imposing her views on groups working with sex workers, even when they don't agree. The best example was the situation in Liverpool - which I doubt she has ever visited, but still felt able to overturn local research and wishes. Second obsession is wanting to abolish jury trials for rape. This is owing to the unsatisfactory level of convictions in such cases. That is something many people are concerned about,. but the problem is and will always be that any system which relies on proving guilt beyond reasonable doubt will always be difficult when no witnesses are present.

But her third obsession is dislike of transsexuals, to the extent that she has resurrected the arguments of Janice Raymond et al. These have been pretty much discredited all told.

I certainly agree that she has the right to express her mistaken view, although I think the Guardian should have more sense than to give her ill-informed rants any space. But it makes no sense at all for Stonewall to give them any credibility. They have made a mistake and should admit it.

Offshore investors

Just been watching a news bulletin where people who had invested offshore are bemoaning their being treated like 'lepers'.

Well, if the shoe fits - these people decided to try and evade their social responsibility by placing their money in tax free environments. Now, they pay the cost, and I have precisely NO sympathy for them at all.

They reap what they sow. There are good times, and there are bad. They accept that they benefited from boom, and they lose during bust.

Defeat for 42 day detention without trial

And i should think so too. Not only is there a loophole which can be used in particularly difficult cases, like other countries, we should simply charge those we suspect and have evidence about. Why the Government allowed themselves to go up this dead end is anyone's guess. The outcome was obvious.

The Killing of Thomas Hurndall

Currently watching this very powerful C4 drama. A no doubt ironical comment about Israel being a 'democracy'. Wrong. It is nothing of the sort. It is a confessional state established out of a sense of misplaced guilt, and should never have been created. The supposed need for a Jewish state is no excuse for the initial confiscation of others' land, let alone their behaviour ever since, which if not for the USA's support would have seen the country fall many years ago. I still think it is unlikely that Israel will survive, long-term, and neither should it. This drama sums up exactly why. It has become a millitaristic bandit country which deserves the epithet 'fascist' every bit as much as the nation which helped to bring it into existence. I cannot see a two state solution happening now, more's the pity, but the time for such compromise seems to have passed. Israel's continued existence in its current position is a threat to world peace, and some other long-term solution will need to be found.

Little comment says it all

You may well have already gathered from my topics chosen on the blog that economics doesn't interest me all that much, but at the moment the papers are full of little else

It is interesting that there appears to be a good deal of consensus, and I have very great doubts as to whether this or any other government will sell on their interests in the banks in future.

Monetarism is clearly heaving its last gasp along with the myth of the unfettered free market, and am sure that Keynes is having a chuckle wherever he is.....

Cameron may still be elected but unless they make a major U-turn, it is hardly going to be under policies recognisable as Tory in recent years. I really don't think he is up to it and hope that somehow, this will be accepted. If we are going to have more social-democratic policies and economic interventionism and regulation, then i would rather it was done by Labour.