Paul Flynn - Read My Day

Reading banned

Tomorrow at twelve noon in Cardiff the names of the fallen in Afghanistan will be read. 

The statue of Aneurin Bevan is the appropriate venue. There will be some rousing speeches. Public opinion is changing. Hearing the long list of the fallen is always moving. A demonstrator was arrested and eventually imprisoned after reading the names of the Iraqi war read at the Cenotaph. The law has now been changed.  Tony Benn last week led the reading of the names.

In parliament I have published in Early Day Motions lists of the dead in both Iraq and Afghanistan. I have also copied them on  blogs. In an Iraq debate I used the ten minutes of my allotted time to read the names of the 179 dead. It is not possible to read the ranks and the names in ten minutes, so  I confined myself to the names. That takes eight minutes. In July I read the Afghan list at the end of a 25 minute speech.

It will not be possible to do that again. It has been decided that the announcement by the Prime Minister of each new death is 'sufficient.' After last year recess, Gordon Brown read out eighteen names. 

Tragically the list in October will certainly be much longer. By then, public support may well have crumbled. 

Chinook ignored

The butterfly concentration of the media is on display today.

There has been acres of publicity on the peripheral issue of helicopters in Afghanistan.  It was an excuse for not thinking. 

Yesterday Britain lost one of only eight Chinooks. It was brought down by Taliban fire. But it was not a SAM missile but machine gun and rocket propelled weapons. Yet there was hardly a mention of the loss in today's news.

I wonder why that is.

Total what?

Two weeks ago I named my favourite blogs.

One of them is BBC's  Vaughan Roderick's blog.  He is in the top ten of media blogs in the  UK's Total Politics poll. That's astonishing. Perhaps I should defend the ratings because this blog is among the top ten political blogs.

While Vaughan deserves the rating, it's impossible that his position is a fair reflection of a large vote across the UK.  The blog is written entirely in Welsh. The result follows a campaign promoting Plaid Cymru blogs. Other parts of the country do not have blogs that have been begging for votes for weeks.

Not so much Total Politics. More Total B*llocks.

Total of British soldiers killed in Afghanistan = 206

Taliban downs Chinook

'More helicopters'  has been one of the false solutions for our problems in Afghanistan. 

Now one has been destroyed by the Taliban. Fortunately there were no deaths. More helicopters mean more targets. Some of them can carry 44 soldiers.

It was the first British helicopter to have been shot down by the Taliban. The Chinook was being operated by the RAF's elite 7 Squadron, part of the Joint Special Forces Aviation Wing, based at RAF Odiham, Hants.

Victory for criminals

Damian Green, the Conservative MP who was arrested by police investigating leaks from the Home Office, is claiming a victory.  For future criminals? Yes. He has had his DNA  removed from the police database. Now thousands of other ‘innocents’ will make the same plea. Some of them were innocent, are innocent and will always be innocent. Others with their DNA on the police databases were innocent, are now guilty and will be guilty in the future. Others were, are and will be guilty. The problem is that neither Damien Green nor anyone else can guarantee anyone’s future conduct.

All criminals start out being innocent. The DNA database works well if there are millions recorded on it. Innocence of one crime is no guarantee for crime-free future conduct. I would be very happy to have my DNA on police files. I have nothing to fear because I do not plan to commit any crimes. Where is the harm of having details on file?

There will now be a stampede of the innocent and the guilty to get their records destroyed. The certain result will be that some future crimes will not be solved.

Not much of a victory, Damien?

Uck, David

David Cameron is troughing.

He reached his peak about six months ago and he is sliding to the trough. He was hopeless on Afghanistan. Today he was embarrassing on the release of the man convicted, but perhaps not guilty’, of the Lockerbie bombing. A new star is born in Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill. His explanation for his decision to release Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi was dignified, persuasive and compassionate.

Cameron’s jibe about a ‘nonsensical’ decision was the cheap jibe of a political huckster. It was good to see tonight that the BBC TV news at six o’clock did not report this attention-seeking stunt. It’s too much to hope that the newspapers will show a bit of restraint and keep the debate on the serious dignified level adopted by the Justice Secretary.

In or out?

I am re-writing my autobiography. I have a chapter about constituents. To illustrate it I included this story in the first edition. I intend to drop it this time because it is so well known. However I tried it on two well-informed political groupies today. One had never heard and laughed out loud. Too good to leave out?

What do you think?

All MPs have their share of strange people. Margaret Beckett had one who complained that he was having troubles from the waves. ‘What waves?’ she asked innocently. He was shocked at her ignorance, ‘the waves from the television set of course. They are entering my head and turning my brains to jelly.’ Margaret was up to the challenge, ‘Have you tried Wellington boots?’ Her constituent was puzzled, ‘No, I haven’t.’ ‘Well,’ she helpfully explained, “It’s an established scientific fact that if you wear Wellington boots while watching television, the waves cannot reach you”. As a trained scientist Margaret speaks with convincing authority. She has never seen the no-doubt satisfied constituent again.

Who is listening?

The long convoluted chat about official language on this week's Radio Four programme Word of my Mouth took me into unexpected territory. Does anyone listen to oral answers in the Commons?

There is a convincing theory that no-one listens to the first answer that Ministers give to an oral question. The House in general switches off. They know it will be a bland and defensive answer. Even the questioners will not hear it.  They will be preoccupied with rehearsing the supplementary questions they are about to ask.

Proof of this was provided by Ynys Mon Plaid Cymru Member Ieuan Wyn Jones on the 10th December 1996. He had asked how many representations the Minister had received on the threatened closure of Benefit offices in Wales.

'A number' said Social Security Minister and Monmouth MP Roger Evans ' contemptuous retort. Ieuan said .... "I am grateful to the Minister for that reply." As the answer was the Parliamentary equivalent to "Get Stuffed' it's reasonable to conclude that Ieuan was not listening to Roger's put-down.

Daringly Peter Bottomley in May 1986 proved the theory by dragging extraneous information into oral replies to Transport Questions. He had a bet with, among others, John Major that he could intersperse extraneous information into oral questions.

I had heard this story but I did not believe. I looked up the Hansard record.

He had a question on the unpromising subject of 'Bus Lanes in London.' He gave three supplementary answers to experienced Commons performers including super backbencher Tony Banks.

Incredibly he weaved into his replies the information that "Anne Boleyn had six fingers on her left hand", that "Burkina Faso means the land of wise men' that "Frogs eat with their eyes shut." and that "13% of people share their bath water."

No-one noticed. Nobody asked whether he had gone off his rocker. Not even the perceptive Tony Banks.

He won his bet.

Public revulsion

The interviews I did on national television on Monday and Tuesday have hit a nerve.

The public are deeply disturbed about the deaths of our soldiers for a cause that few support. Many messages have come in. For once they are all supportive. One today was from an 85 year man from Ebbw Vale. He told me he has had a long life and suffered many tragedies. But he urged me to carry on campaigning about the futile slaughter in Afghanistan because he so upset by the images on the television. It's heartening that he thought it was worthwhile to go to the great trouble of sending me a letter.

Opinion polls show that the weak public support is collapsing. Even the stream of military and political figures that have been paraded before the TV camera to mouth comforting lies, have not convinced the country. 

Each soldier is mourned three times. First deaths are announced. The next day names are published. A week later the coffins arrive and we hear the sobbing of the families in Wotton Bassett.

The cumulative effect of the deaths of these brave soldiers will erode the already tottering arguments for continue our presence in Helmand. It was interesting to see a hard interview on Newsnight tonight. Kirsty Wark against Douglas Alexander if our soldiers were dying for Karzai's human rights laws.

 If we do not find an orderly  way to walk out of the country after doing a deal, we may have to run out in a rout of panic later.

Empty Vessel Cameron

Behind David Cameron's shiny superficial exterior is a shiny superficial interior. 

The Tory leader was interviewed on Sky Television today. About a third of the way through the interminable drivel,  the interviewer was  bored and started to repeat his questions. The subject was Afghanistan.

Cameron had nothing to say. I presume that

 he wanted to get some words in on the big issue of the day.  He fought to look strong, determined, prime ministerial. But there was not a scintilla of a fresh idea or a policy. He has been a full collaborator with the Government is the sins of omission that have created the avoidable slaughter of our soldiers. The Tories did not object when we drifted into Helmand blithely unaware that we were taunting an enraged bull.

Pressed to say what new policies he would introduce on Afghanistan, he said that he would have a more 'focussed' policy. Asked how, he said something to the effect that he would make sure that his new focus had  'err...err... greater focus'. It sounded like a comedian mocking the vacuity of political double-talk. There is a hideous  crisis. Our soldiers are being killed and maimed. 

The official opposition has nothing to say.

Obsessive

Has John Reid MP become obsessed?

There was further evidence this morning when I was shown an extraordinary document. At the end of my interview with BBC Breakfast I mentioned the turning point of the Helmand invasion. I was challenged by one of the interviewers. I quoted John Reid's talk of 'not a  shot being fired', in the same week in 2006 as I said that Helmand would be as futile and bloody as the Charge of the Light Brigade.

 The interview was effectively over but one of the presenters  asked an additional question which was supportive of John Reid. All BBC presenters have been given a two page document saying how they must be careful when mentioning John Reid 's comment to balance it with his warnings about the danger of Helmand.

I believe all Labour MPs have had an ever longer four page document in a similar vein. I certainly have had one. What is going on? What John said cannot be un-said. Whatever he does, history will garland him with the words about not a shot being fired. It is inescapable. John Gummer will always be remembered for forcing a hamburger on his daughter. Edwina Currie's frank but truthful comment about salmonella will be her political obituary. Nothing can change a foolish act that has been endlessly re-broadcast by the media.

 On the Today programme John Reid  said in 2006, "Let me put it in simple terms that people will understand.  If we came for three years here to accomplish our mission and had not fired one shot at the end of it we would be very happy indeed."

The people of BBC Breakfast yesterday shook their heads in disbelief at what appears to be an extraordinary attempt to erase the regretted words from the chronicle of history. 

Why the fuss? The more he defends himself, the more often his original unwise words are repeated. Forget it John. You are making the situation worse. The price of holding high office is that you are responsible for the blunders that happen on your watch. There have been few mistakes worse than our invasion of Helmand Province when Reid was Defence Secretary. Couldn't be that John's notorious outside financial interests with the security industry are at stake?

Hope gleams?

Yesterday BBC Breakfast kindly teamed me up in an interview with Clare Lockhart.  Meeting her was an inspiration. She has worked in Afghanistan for five years for the World Bank.  She loves and understands the country but left because of the 'corruption'. Unfortunately I have not read her book. It's on order.

 She has a plausible convincing hope that the UK could de-couple from the USA in Afghanistan. An exit strategy for us? Yesterday on BBC Breakfast, she answered the questions that the interviewers asked rather than present her main argument. That is always a temptation.  Fortunately she had another opportunity later to put her persuasive case on BBC News.

 More after I have read the book.

  

Truth on Afghanistan

I've often tried it, but it rarely works.

I had a call this morning from BBC News - formerly News 24. The request was for an interview on Compass's document on a maximum wage. I told the researcher they lack a critical voice on the nonsense being broadcast about a victory in Afghanistan. They agreed and I had interview at 11.30 am this morning. 

This had an impact with a couple of messages on yesterdays' blog and phones calls. All have been supportive. The main BBC News today had an informative item illustrating the failure of $25 billion aid to help lift poverty for the Afghans. When can we hear about the depraved thieving drug addicts of the Karzai Police and the oppressive war lords? 

There are many new people reading the site and I will do more high profile television in the next few days. That is why I am blogging lightly so the case of Afghanistan can be read.

Who has been clawed?

Total number of British deaths in Afghanistan = 204

The deaths news from Afghanistan is relentless. Something must give in the public's vague support for a misunderstood war. Today the news has been dominated by purring voices saying we must continue to suffer the daily toll of slaughter. Our soldiers have bled from the Panther's Claw.

Please, someone, tell me why. We are making NO progress. The Taliban occupy more territory. There are more drugs and worst human rights. But we are told we must continue. Why? It's not working. It's time to fix a new strategy. 

Today's dawn to dusk media blitz of comfort words prove that panic is near. How much longer will public opinion be fooled?

I repeat my case.

“How do you ask a man to be last one to die for a mistake?”

Vietnam veteran and US Senator struggled with that question in 1971. British politicians should be haunted by the same nightmare. Our war in Afghanistan has reached a similar stage.

Kerry contined in 1971, ' Each day to facilitate the process by which the United States washes her hands off Vietnam someone has to keep up his life so that the United States doesn’t have to admit something that the whole world already knows, so that we can’t say we made a mistake.’

Then US politicians said what our UK politicians are saying now, ‘We cannot afford to lose.’ Then the fear was the domino effect. If Vietnam went communist so would all other countries in South East Asia. It was a lie of course. Now we are told that terrorism in Britain is held back because of our war in Afghanistan. That’s a lie too. If it was true we should have plans to start new wars in Pakistan, Somalia and the Yemen.

Now we are told soldiers must keep on dying. Perhaps for another forty years.
For which of the following causes:-

* To guarantee the re-election of a corrupt President and his newly rich family.
* To allow the depraved thieves of the Afghan Police to rule the villages.
* To continue the abject failure of the policy to eradicate drugs that has flooded the world market            with cheap heroin.
* To strengthen the oppressive medieval warlords
* To defend barbaric human rights practices.
* Or because no politician will admit that it was stupid to stir up the hornets’ nest of Helmand.

It’s a secret but Britain is talking now-with the Taliban. We have being so for a year in a neutral state. This is how the script has been written for the future.

First, Operation Panther’s Claw will redistribute our soldiers in Helmand Province and send some some Taliban running to the hills. Secondly, We claim this as a great victory. Thirdly, we do a deal with the ‘Moderate” Taliban who will be demoralized by our military might.

Last month, David Milliband paused and looked unsettled when I ask him whether he had ever talked to any member of the Taliban. He said he had not.  But his body language said that he wish he had.

All wars end in deals and the insurgeants always win against an alien invader. The Taliban will stay and we will go. But it’s easier to repeat an old lie than reveal a new truth.

Politicians are in denial and refuse to confront the deep futility of the war in Afghanistan. It's more comfortable to tilt at the windmills of peripheral issues. Last year fellow European countries were howled at for dodging their share of the burden. Now, it's the myth that more troops and helicopters are solutions.
The media serve up delusional pap from embedded journalists. The key issues are ugly truths on Karzai's corruption, evil human rights record and the atrocities of his police and army. Politicians blaming foreigners or each other are on comfortable ground. It’s easier than thinking.

One un-embedded Reuter’s reporter revealed the hatred that the people of Helmand have for Karzai's police. The message from an elder in the newly liberated Pankela village in Helmand was, "For God's sake do not bring back the Afghan police.

"The police would stop people driving on motorcycles, beat them and take their money," said Mohammad Gul, a village elder. He pointed to two compounds where pre-teen children had been abducted by police to be used for the local practice of "bachabazi," or sex with pre-pubescent boys. "If the boys were out in the fields, the police would come and rape them," he said. "You can go to any police base and you will see these boys."

When the Taliban arrived in the village 10 months ago and drove the police out, local people rejoiced, said Mohammad Rasul, an elderly farmer. "The Taliban never bothered us," he said.

Parliament's Foreign Affair Select Committee has heard evidence from David Loyn that the '60% of Afghan Police are addicted to heroin', and many of them are deeply involved in facilitating the drug trade. Few are paid and most are Uzbek remnants of the loathed Northern Alliance. Their role is to enrich themselves by theft and extortion. All the main parties in the House of Commons spout the fiction that Karzai's Gestapo will win over hearts and minds. Unchallenged is NATO’s plan for Karzai’s police to move into the villages when the bullets stop flying.

British lives are being lost to maintain Karzai as president. His record on human right includes his refusal to pardon a young man sentenced to 20 years in prison for accessing an internet article on women's rights, while pardoning a group of young men guilty of gang-raping a 13 year old girl. A suspended Afghan woman MP and human rights' prize winner Malalai Joya said that the rights of women in Afghanistan now are worse than under the Taliban.

Of the $25 billion aid poured for Afghanistan, only 20 per cent reached its intended recipients. The increase in the number of new Afghan millionaires and billionaires in Kabul include members of President Karzai's family. Meanwhile poverty is deepening among other Afghanis. After eight years of generous Western aid, Afghanistan has the world's third highest child mortality rate and the world's second highest maternity mortality rate.

The tipping point into disaster was the spring of 2006. Then our Defence Secretary hoped that the Helmand mission would last three years without ‘a shot being fired.’ Then only seven British soldiers had died – five in accidents. Those of us who opposed mission forecast a disaster on the scale of the charge of the light brigade. It’s been worse. 118 died in the Victorian charge of futility. 206 British soldiers died after the Helmand hornets’ nest was disturbed.
Our current political debate is self-indulgent and negligent of our duty to lead. More troops mean more targets for IEDs and more deaths. More helicopters could mean that British casualties would be reported not as single deaths but in groups of thirties and forties.

In 2001 an ebullient member of the Russian Duma thumped me on the back and gave me his mock congratulations. “You Brits are very clever. You have captured Afghanistan. We Russians did that – in six days. We were there for 10 years. We spent billions of rubles, killed a million Afghanis, and lost 15,000 of our soldiers. When we ran out, there were 300,00 Mujahaddin in the hills around Kabul. It will happen to you.’

President Obama has a practical approach. He has appointed a new Nato Supremo who has used the previously forbidden words of ‘exit’ and ‘defeat.’ We should dump the illusion of victory and devise a peace exit strategy. It could consolidate the few gains made and avoid the bloodbath of the panic retreat of the Americans from Saigon. Public opinion will not tolerate indefinitely the pointless slaughter of our soldiers.

Clinging to myths is a deadly distraction. Afghans say that 'Truth is like the sun. When it rises it is impossible to hide it'.

It will be some time before truth dawns in our Parliament.

Not Saigon likely

Forty years of this?.........  Not Saigon Likely.

British public opinion will not tolerate decades  of paying the price in blood and treasure of a meaningless war. The Vietnam War ended in defeat because American public opinion was sickened by the increasing numbers of their soldiers returning in bodybags.

The  200th UK death will concentrate public attention on the futility  of our cause. Brave professional soldiers are ordered to die in a cause that is already lost. The lies will be exposed.

Are Karzai's human rights worth the sacrifice?

Afghanistan passes 'barbaric' law diminishing women's rights

Afghanistan has quietly passed a law permitting Shia men to deny their wives food and sustenance if they refuse to obey their husbands' sexual demands, despite international outrage over an earlier version of the legislation which President Hamid Karzai had promised to review.

The new final draft of the legislation also grants guardianship of children exclusively to their fathers and grandfathers, and requires women to get permission from their husbands to work.

"It also effectively allows a rapist to avoid prosecution by paying 'blood money' to a girl who was injured when he raped her," the US charity Human Rights Watch said.

 

America shamed in LA

It's the same questions. 

How could a country that nobly sacrificed more  lives  of their soldiers  than any other country in defence of the freedom of others nation now be comparing their president to Adolf Hitler? How could the country that nurtured George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, John Kennedy and Barack Obama  have produce Johnson, Reagan and the Bushes? How could a country of great writers and scientists produce a moronic regiment of birthers and religious bigots?

My rightly angry blog yesterday stirred a  hornets nest. Two comments were received from the States. . They illustrated  my point with a fine display of angry hysteria. One mysteriously called me a 'shill'. It is someone who poses as a satisfied customer or an enthusiastic gambler to dupe bystanders into participating in a swindle. That a new insult. The Americans were brilliantly squashed by Newport correspondents

The USA is not the only country with an abundant crop of crackpots and conspiracy theorists. Many African Americans believe crack cocaine and AIDS were whipped up in government laboratories to kill black people.

Right now, however, the most active and vocal fruitcakes are self-styled "conservatives" who concoct a new scary fantasy every week to prove that Barack Obama is the greatest threat to America since the Red Menace.

 Now, a serious percentage of Americans express genuine horror that their country is being stolen from them. They have been told Obama and the Democrats are going to take away their health care and euthanise their grannies. They attend tea-bagger rallies where participants hold aloft pictures of Obama morphed into Adolph Hitler. They click onto web sites that suggest Jesus Christ, himself, used thinly coded language to send a message across the centuries that someone with a name that, in Hebrew, sounds very much like Barack Obama would be Satan incarnate.

The Birthers tortured souls are consumed with the fairy tale that Obama was not born in the United States and is, therefore, not eligible to hold the highest office in the land. Despite assurances from state officials in Hawaii, despite newspaper notices of Obama's birth in Honolulu, despite the fact Obama has travelled on a U.S. passport for many years, despite pleas by reputable conservatives to just let the issue go, the Birthers will not relent. Some believe that Jesus Christ, himself, used thinly coded language to send a message across the centuries that someone with a name that, in Hebrew, sounds very much like Barack Obama would be Satan incarnate.".

Obama is America's and the world's best hope for sane policies. He is an original thinker and, in my view, a great writer. A bit of a contrast to Bush who blundered into two wars. So many Americans are blind to the reality of the US Health (lack of ) Service as reported today. This is the country where they are rubbishing our NHS

They came in their thousands, queuing through the night to secure one of the coveted wristbands offering entry into a strange parallel universe where medical care is a free and basic right and not an expensive luxury. Some of these Americans had walked miles simply to have their blood pressure checked, some had slept in their cars in the hope of getting an eye-test or a mammogram, others had brought their children for immunisations that could end up saving their life.

In the week that Britain's National Health Service was held aloft by Republicans as an "evil and Orwellian" example of everything that is wrong with free healthcare, these extraordinary scenes in Inglewood, California yesterday provided a sobering reminder of exactly why President Barack Obama is trying to reform the US system.

The LA Forum, the arena that once hosted sell-out Madonna concerts, has been transformed – for eight days only – into a vast field hospital. In America, the offer of free healthcare is so rare, that news of the magical medical kingdom spread rapidly and long lines of prospective patients snaked around the venue for the chance of getting everyday treatments that many British people take for granted.

 Americans should hang their heads in shame.

Total of British soldiers killed in Afghanistan = 201

 

 

Unsafe in their hands

Why are so many Americans so stupid?

Is the country really overrun by conspiracy theorists and right wing religious bigots?  Protesters yesterday carried posters of Barack Obama with a Hitler moustache. Could any insult be more off target?

They believe that the president is a Nazi who wants to take away health care from the elderly and that he is somehow advocating euthanasia. Their television channels are pumping out lies about our health service abetted by the strange Tory MEP  Daniel Hannan  who wants to scrap the NHS.

Informed by this British MEP, one TV debate discussed whether Obama’s  ‘socialist’ health reforms will a breeding ground for terrorists. The wild anger has been stoked up lobbyists in the pay  of the greedy grasping insurance companies that are an incubus on the back of American Health industry.

Why don’t these Americans appreciate that they have their most intelligent and idealistic president ever? Are they sorry that they no longer  have someone in the White House who is as stupid as they are?

Obama has proved his courage by introducing these reforms. Hilary Clinton tried and she was beaten down. Obama has four years and plenty of intelligence and guile to transform a rotten system that picks the pockets of Americans with an expensive poor value health service. Future generations will bless him for it. 

Irish sense

I did a phone-in tonight on Ireland's top radio programme. 

The subject was the decision on women’s boxing. The interviewer was mildly hostile because Ireland has some skilled women boxers that have Olympic expectations. The producer rang me after the broadcast to say that there was a favourable e-mail response. This is a rare service.

 

The might of the BMA is behind the campaign to expose the unique dangers of boxing. The great mystery is why women are attrcated to a sport that risks black eyes, broken noses and cauliflower ears? I have yet to hear any convincing answer to the evidenec on brain damage and premature Alzheimers.

Who will willingly risk that?

Al-cannot

The announcement of the closure of Aluminum smelting in Anglesey is a body blow for the island.

The poor prospects for the industry hit Newport as well.  Even with the £millions of Welsh Assembly and Government money that was on offer to assist both plant, the future is hopeless. The balance sheet for the past five-year at Novelis/Alcan at Newport was depressing even without the Credit Crunch. 

The loss of manufacturing jobs hurts Newport and Anglesey. My habitat is heavy industry and I greatly regret the loss of jobs and skills. But with Alcan it was inevitable.

Equality of degradation

Tessa Jowell shamefully hails the promotion of women’s boxing as a victory for women’s rights. That the right to suffer brain damage, premature Alzheimer’s and brain scars. Politically correct? Yes. Barmy? Yes.

Boxing is unique in encouraging blows to the head. In fact it is the principal way to win. Football is quoted as another sport that allows damage to brain cells through heading balls. A soccer player heads the ball an average of twice in each game. A boxer can receive 100s of blows to the head in a single bout. It is almost as bad as using a person's head as a football.

The brain is suspended in the skull like a jelly in a box, held by strings. A blow causes the brain to strike the walls of the skull. One neurosurgeon has claimed that 80% of all boxers have brain scarring as a result of the cumulative effects of blow.

A bill of mine to ban head blows was first presented to parliament in 1998 - but was defeated by time. My bill was entirely based on new evidence of brain damage caused the cumulative effects of boxing. The British Medical Association has said that boxing should be completely banned. There are two problems. There are those occasional tragedies where someone is killed or critically injured, plus there is the chronic problem that when someone is hit on the head they have a minor degree of injury to the brain. This becomes cumulative and then we cannot repair the damage with small tears. In extreme cases, severe Parkinson's disease can set in

Ten good reasons for banning blows to the head

MOHAMMED ALI (Parkinsons)

STEVE WATT (died) v Rocky Kelly, March 14, 1986, at Fulham. Brutal fight, which lasted 10 rounds, between welterweights fighting for right to challenge for Southern Area title. The neurologist claimed Watt's brain had several old injuries.

ROD DOUGLAS (injured) v Herol Graham, Oct 25, 1989, at Wembley. Douglas was expected to win this British middleweight title fight, but was given boxing lesson and slow beating before ninth-round stoppage. He collapsed on way home, but has recovered.

MARK GOULT (injured) v Danny Porter, March 20, 1990, at Norwich. Hard encounter for vacant Southern Area bantamweight title, won by Goult, who later complained of dizziness. He remains in a wheelchair.

MICHAEL WATSON (injured) v Chris Eubank, Sept 21, 1991, at White Hart Lane. Vacant WBO super-middleweight fight in which Eubank and Watson were both down in 11th round. Both were exhausted after fight that was too personal. Watson is suing the BBBC for negligence and has only just started to walk again.

BRADLEY STONE (died) v Richie Wenton, April 26, 1994, at York Hall, Bethnal Green. Hard fight for vacant British super-bantamweight title, won by Wenton in round 10 when Stone was rescued by referee. Stone, 23, left the ring, but collapsed later. Died two days after.

GERALD McCLELLAN (injured) v Nigel Benn, Feb 25, 1995, at London Arena. After 10 savage rounds in WBCsuper-middleweight fight, American McClellan was rescued by referee. Minutes later he collapsed, but was revived before undergoing emergency surgery. Has now lost his sight.

JIMMY MURRAY (died) v Drew Docherty, Oct 13, 1995, in Glasgow. Murray was winning British bantamweight fight before fading and then collapsing in round 12. He died that night after surgery.

CARL WRIGHT (injured) v Mark Winters, Oct 11, 1997, at Sheffield. Vacant British light-welter. Winters was given decision in fight for vacant British light-welterweight title. Wright fell unconscious several hours after fight and was immediately operated on.

JOHNNY OWEN (Died): September 1980: Owen was stretchered out through a rabid auditorium, the Welsh entourage having urine thrown at them and their pockets picked as they left the ring. He was taken to taken to California Hospital. It was later found that he had an unusually fragile skull and thick jaw, meaning that the fatal blow could have come at any time in his career.

A Dance Czar?

This is surely the end. The country needs a dance Czarina? Why? Are we being tested to see how much nonsense we can take?

Afghan hope?

There are more signs of sense emerging as we fall deeper into  the vortex of futility and death in Afghanistan. Obama is talking of a mid-term re-assessment. There is a rising realisation among Americans that they are repeating the mistakes of the Vietnam War. Meanwhile Britain's main parties continue with their self delusions of victory and success.

Meanwhile our brave soldiers die and we salute them. In 2006 when I spoke against the deployment in Helmand, 7 British soldiers had died. 5 in accidents. As a result of  Helmand the total will soon pass another dreadful milestone of 200. To avoid facing the central hopeless policy politicians  are distracted by  peripheral issues.

Total number of British soldiers killed in Afghanistan = 199

Brain damage is a right

Brain damage is a right not a privilege.

That is the message from the British Olympics. Woman are to have the same right as men to have their brains damaged. Repeated blows to the head destroy brain cells that are never replaced. The damage is imperceptible and cumulative. It results in early senility. It was what the boxing fraternity once called being 'punch drunk'. We do not use such a crude term for Mohammed Ali's  health problems.

Now we understand the damage that results from blows to the head. The aim of boxing is to score points with blows to the head and body. The best render their opponents unconscious. That is brain damage. Perhaps a sophisticated way to decided the winner would be to measures who destroyed the greatest number of brain cells.

Politicians demand that women be treated on equal terms with men. 

A barbarity shared is a barbarity doubled

Stay Rhodri
Rhodri Morgan, the Leader of the Welsh nation has an Obama high popularity score than even Obama would envy now.

Today, the Guardian devoted an editorial to him.

“In Wales, serenity reigns and grown-up government is modestly maintained from a caravan near one of the loveliest beaches in Ceredigion. First minister Rhodri Morgan has holidayed man and boy at Mwnt on the west Wales coast for more than 40 years.”

Rhodri is unimpressed by his office and loves the bay at Mwnt. He has his mobile phone with him and can be contacted if any crises develop.

 The Guardian concludes,

‘Not for the first time, Mr Morgan offers a lesson to his London Labour counterparts on how to do things with common sense and good grace."

 There is a lesson here, Rhodri. You said you were thinking of retiring after your birthday in late September. You did not say WHICH birthday. You have another birthday in September 2010. Leave the resignation for a month after that and you can preside at the Ryder Cup.

At the moment the Labour Party is not awash with popular politicians or alternative First Ministers of the Welsh Assembly

Duncan dipstick

John Bercow look-alike, Alan Duncan MP had a funny turn today he said,  "The last thing people want to hear is an MP whingeing about his pay and conditions."

Previously the Tory MP was filmed saying that MPs were being treated like shit after the expenses scandal and "have to live on rations".

No one has explained to me why anyone should be able to claim for their constituency gardens, duck houses or moats. Alan is still justifying his claim.

He says: "I spend my money on my garden and claim a tiny fraction based on what is proper. And I could claim the whole bloody lot, but I don't. About £2,000 a year and this was £1,000 a year on expenses, you know. It's just, I'm afraid the world has gone mad."

No, No, Alan. It’s you and lots of other MPs who are suffering from a touch of madness. This is a disappointment. I admire Duncan's espousal of drugs legalisation in his book Saturn's Children. Sadly he omitted the chapter when his book was re-published after he was promoted to the Tory frontbench. Alas that did not last long.

He resigned from the position within a month after it emerged that he had used the right-to-buy programme to make profits on property deals. He had lent his elderly next-door neighbour money to buy his home under the right-to-buy legislation. The neighbour bought the 18th century council house at a significant discount and sold it to Duncan just over three years later. That was really naughty. You have not grasp the point, Alan. It was meant to be a right to buy your own house not your neighbours.

Homage to Wales

Researching into material for my new book. I came across this literary gem.  I was visited by the Muse when provoked by a remark by Tony Blair. It was at the time when he was fixing the Assembly election for Alun Michael to avoid the democratic choice of Rhodri Morgan. It’s not great poetry or even great doggerel, but eat your heart out, Jolly Roger.

'The Welsh must put aside their dark, despairing Celtic side’ - Tony Blair, February 20th 1999.

 

Hopeless, wretched little land,
Too sad, too Welsh to understand,
Forget your Mabinogion,
Ape the folk of Islington

To save you from mad kith and kin,
I have sent you Little Alun.
Your Celtic thoughts are dark and mixed
So his election I have fixed.

For your despair, I give you hope,
No need for you to try to cope
With home rule for your puny state,
From Downing Street I’ll seal your fate.

Boyo-dom on Taff, Alun will run,
Lots of work, no joy, no fun
Rhodri wouldn’t do at all,
Too bright and funny, and far too tall.

You gloomy Taffies, now rejoice
I’ve given you your own small voice,
An extra gift is this wise wish,
Be joyful, humble and - more English.

By Rupert Blair