Turley reaps the whirlwind

Turkey has always been a country that forms a bridge. Between continents, religions, regions, cultures.

For Turkey, it is somehow necessary to hold contradicting positions at the same time. Turkey shows different faces to the different parts of the world it borders as a matter of course.

But somehow, Turkey is in trouble.

President Erdogan is nominally an Islamist. In many ways, political Islam's greatest success.

For this reason he supported the rebellion in Syria. This was in contradiction with a previous statement on foreign policy. 'Zero problems with neighbours'.

The Syria policy may have been designed to remake Turkey as the leader of the Sunni Muslim world. But it created problems not only with Syria, but also with Russia, Iran, Iraq and Lebanon.

Quite a few more problems than zero.

Worse than that, Turkey has a weakspot. In the South East a restive Kurdish population. The alliance backing Syria's president Assad becamse quite friendly with Kurds fighting against IS. These Kurds were closely linked to Turkish Kurds firghting the Turkish state.

Then came the kicker. a pretty serious attempt at a military coup. This coup attempt originated in the Gulenist movement. Gulen is in the USA, and the USA refuses to extradite him.

Turkish conspiracy theorists believe the Gulenist movement was founded by the CIA. Gulen himself may have had some links with US intelligence at some point in his life, but I do not believe this was an attempt by the US to overthrow the Turkish government.

Nevertheless, the words of support for the elected Turkish government from the West did seem rather lukewarm. Their condemnation of the coup somewhat equivocal.

The rumour is, Erdogan was given a warning of what was coming. That warning came not from the West, but from Russia.

So now Turkey realigns, not with NATO and the gulf monarchies, but with Russia and Iran.

A Russo-Turkish alliance looks to have great potential. And Turkey, being a member of NATO, and of huge strategic importance really is a prize.

But Turkey has stoked the flames of Islamism in Syria for too long. Now that Turkey switches sides, there will be blowback. There will be a price to pay. Erdogan has sown the wind. Erdogan's Turkey will reap the whirlwind.

Doubtless Mr Putin will be keen to explain, there is nothing so useful as a common enemy for uniting the people behind a leader.

Putin has all but pulled Turkey into his gang. Which way Trump?

Brexit Fantasy Island

The UK has voted for Brexit. To leave the EU.

In a campaign powered by disillusionment with the political, business & journalistic elite, UK voters rejected warnings of impending doom and decided to leave the biggest trading bloc on earth.

We are left with a minister for Brexit, Mr David Davis, MP for Haltemprice and Howden who appears totally out of his depth.

He has said the UK might establish trading relationships which amount to a free trade area ten times the size of the EU. Seemingly unaware that the EU makes up more than 10% of the world economy, meaning this would require our free trade area to extend beyond planet earth.

He also seems to lack basic awareness of what a trading bloc is. Having implied the UK might negotiate separate deals with different EU member states. This is particularly strange, as one of the criticisms of UK membership of the EU was that it prevented us from negotiating separate deals with non EU member states.

No matter, the rank incompetence of Mr Davis hardly registers when compared to the wilfully destructive act of appointing Mr Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary. At first sight a totally bizarre move, for while Mr Johnson is undoubtedly intelligent richly talented, he is no diplomat. It's a bit like Barcelona playing Lionel Messi in goal. Ridiculous. Even professional diplomats like the US state department spokesman could hardly keep a straight face at the news.

Then there is Liam Fox. Disgraced former Cabinet minister, with a unique approach to charity (meaning he seems to think it is something that flows inwards, rather than outwards). Again, so far out of his depth it hardly bears comment.

Much has been made of how the Trump phenomenon in the US mirrors the UK Brexit vote. And it does.

Yet there is another parallel, so far unremarked. Trump may be the scourge of the Republican party establishment, but he is also the inevitable result of the politics they have been pursuing since the time of Reagan. Persuading blue collar ageing white males to vote against their economic interests for reasons of 'identity'. Stoking up fear on immigration, and terrorism. Thriving on barely concealed 'othering' of vast segments of the population. In truth Reagan may embody much of what led to Trump, but it can also be argued this sort of theing began with Barry Goldwater, or Richard Nixon's 'Southern Strategy'.

Likewise in the UK, the Conservative party establishment has spend a generation or more demonising the EU. Along with various other groups, including migrants.

Then they got bitten by the beast they created.

It has been amusing to watch Tories, only too eager to benefit from smears on their left wing opponents in the right wing press howling in outrage under the same treatment.

And then you realise, it is the future of our country these people play with.

You might well ask how a new prime minister managed to appoint so poorly. The answer is clear. If your desire is to cling to power in Number 10 Downing Street, as opposed to make sure the country is as well represented as it can be, these are superb appointments. In her first outing at Prime Minister's Questions Theresa May accused Jeremy Corbyn of putting personal ambition before the good of his party. This is an accusation that does not stick. Many of Mr Corbyn's detractors claim the opposite, he is simply not ambitious enough for a would be Prime Minister.

Mrs May's accusation is Trump like projection. She is the one driven not by principle or some great goal, but pure, unbridled personal ambition. Cameron believed in nothing but his God given right to rule. May believes whe has worked hard enough to 'earn' her time in Number 10. That she deserves it.

To be clear, the EU was and is a flawed organisation. The case for remaining was no slam dunk. But we did not have any sort of debate on the merits of membership versus leaving. We had a rabble rousing fest.

Our forbears fought and died for privileges we now call 'rights'. Democracy foremost among them. Neither the populace nor the elite are worthy inheritors.

Trump the nominee

So he has done it. Or at least got half way there.

Mr Trump has all but won the Republican nomination to run for the Whitehouse.

Much as I, personally, like Bernie Sanders, Mrs Clinton will be his opponent, barring some sort of miracle or natural disaster.

Whatever the American establishment may think, a country can survive being lead by an individual that it is difficult to take seriously. Just think about Italy and Silvio Berlusconi.

That doesn't mean he will be President.

I don't much like Mrs Clinton, but I would think him a much worse choice than her.

The conventional wisdom is he cannot win. He will be slaughtered in a general election.

After all, Mr Trump has insulted not only Muslims and immigrants, but also Mexicans and women.

Women alone make up more than half of the electorate. His tally must be at least 60% of voters insulted.

Surely he can't win?

Thing is, only people abnormally interested in politics have really been paying attention.

Mr Trump has strong appeal amongst poorer white people. People who would have had solid union jobs in past generations. There is no doubt in my mind he will be able to portray himself very differently indeed when it comes to the general election.

The transformation will be shameless. Mrs Clinton may find it difficult to cope with that. To take him seriously.

And Mrs Clinton herself is rather unpopular. Very unpopular with republicans. Could be she is just the person to motivate republicans to get up and out and vote for Trump.

I am aware that people who know far more about US politics than I do give him no chance. But those people also gave him no chance at the primaries.

Mr Trump will be able to portray himself as the insurgent against the Clinton establishment. And however Mrs Clinton chooses to play it, there will be a whole raft of people saying vote Clinton just because she is a woman. That could backfire. It wouldn't sound very good coming from a man.

Janet Yellen was given the Federal Reserve job when an outsider should really have been picked. Christine Lagarde became head of the IMF when Europe should really have backed away.

Were I inclined to conspiracy theories I would believe that elites hand leadership roles to women as a last resort to stop power dissipating further.

Mrs Clinton comes across as calculated. Devoid of principles, I have heard her Democratic party described as a brokerage for interest groups. That's an unkind way of putting their point that demography is on their side.

If I were to pick a candidate to neutralise Mr Trump's appeal, Bernie Sanders would be a much better bet than Hilary Clinton.

For years, we on the left have been told we must accept establishment candidates, because a true leftist has no chance of winning. How ironic it would be were Mrs Clinton to lose precisely because she was so establishment.

And what a shame if the first serious female candidate were to lose because she was too establishment.

The Donald. And Women

Reports of Mr Trump's political demise have been much exaggerated. Particularly at the beginning of his campaign, comments directed at various women were pretty unsavoury. But nothing seemed to really have much of an impact.

He took a leaf from Karl Rove's book and disrespected a genuine US war hero. John McCain.

He picked a fight with the pope.

He insulted a Fox News Anchor (Megyn Kelly), and boycotted their debate.

If a candidate can insult war heroes. Disrespect religious leaders and walk all over Fox News, how can they also convincingly lead the race for the Republican nomination?

Whatever the reasons for Trump's success, I would suggest that anyone who who is familiar with traditional blue collar/working class communities anywhere in the Western World is somewhat less surprised than the political/journalistic elite.

Not surprised at all, in fact.

This is a demographic whose interests the traditional parties of the left have triangulated to extinction. Protest and identity are what remain.

Strange how triangulation disenfranchises people at the bottom more than those at the top.

Yet Mr Trump now seems to have pushed a little too far. After having a deeply ambiguous stance on abortion, from being very pro-choice to staunchly against, he managed to touch something of a raw nerve. Mr Trump advocated criminal sanction against women who had an abortion.

At last Mr Trump has shown that while his bombast and populism can demonstrate real appeal, he doesn't really understand the people he purports to represent. He is just another member of the elite. He thought that the touchstone right wing issue of abortion was a stick with which to beat women. A mistake he holds in common with many feminists.

While women, particularly poor women, might be amongst those who most suffer when access to abortion is restricted, that is not the objective of the policy.

There are also many women, often married women, who are coerced into abortion. Mr Trumps voter's are only too happy to blame the doctors who perform abortions. They are also a little too ready to deny the women that seek abortion agency. They are viewed as victims, not perpetrators.

People who are liable to vote for Mr Trump don't like abortion because they don't like the people who do like it. Because they associate it with the breakdown of family and community that has afflicted them. And because they have a cultural affinity, they share an identity with, those who oppose abortion on moral/religious grounds.

Mr Trump revealed something of himself, he really is a misogynist. His polling numbers amongst women who identify as Republicans are extremely poor.

His traditional male, working class/blue collar voters may not like feminism, but they absolutely hate wife beaters. Or men who abuse women in any way at all.

Chivalry is a form of sexism. I would contend misogyny is a very different beast. Many people who describe themselves as feminists may disagree. Mr Trump also cannot see the difference.

The divergence of East and West

Today there two big news stories.

Firstly, the US Supreme Court has upheld a fundamental right to marriage for all citizens, including those that wish to marry others of the same gender.

Secondly there have been  a spate of attacks claimed by IS, in Syria, in Kuwait, Tunisia and France. In Yemen. A ring of blood around the Mediterranean.

While the West (right wing social conservatives not withstanding) drifts to ever more liberal stances, the East sinks further into fundamentalism.

There are minorities on both sides, but the polarisation is clear. IS watching openly gay people in the US celebrate a victory will be yet more convinced they are right, and their enemies are evil.

Devout waverers who disapprove of the more extreme IS violence may well look at the decadence of the Western alternative and decide IS to be the lesser of two evils.

All around the world, ordinary people will be aware that while the Arab world drowns in blood, the west immerses itself in a philosophical argument about the nature of marriage.

Outside our bubble this looks like self indulgence.

The horrors visited on the Middle East, in part having grown out of Western interventions, are old news even before they are yesterday's news.

I have no strong feelings on this supreme court judgement, other than its irrelevance to real life.

If the biggest problem you have is the state's refusal to issue a certificate recognising your relationship, you don't have a problem.

On the other hand, if your biggest problem is the state does issue certificates recognising relationships you don't like, you really don't have a problem.

We collectively do have a problem in engaging with a region which we cannot  begin to comprehend. Russia is authoritarian and increasingly homophobic.

It appears they understand the Middle East a bit better than we do.

Can the oppressed become the oppressor?

There has been much talk lately about racism, and what it is.

There are two views of racism, that it is the manifestation of prejudice held within the heart of an individual, or that it is a societal thing, embedded in our institutions. Examples of the first is an individual who shouts offensive comments at a minority person from a car window. The judgement passed on London's Metropolitan police by the infamous McPherson report give ample demonstration of the second.

It is possible to believe think that both forms exist.

There is, though, the opinion that people from an oppressed minority cannot be racist. In fact, the word minority there is redundant. Who could argue that Black South Africans although a majority, were not oppressed?

So, it is argued, that the oppressed cannot be racist.

Women cannot be sexist.

People argue this from both sides. I think any reasonable person would agree that it is white racism that poses the biggest problem for societies across the world, that macro, institutional racism is white

Does that really mean a black person cannot be racist?

I believe that the human race is one big family. And that those who try to divide on lines of race are racist. Tribalism is a basic human instinct. It can be channelled for good, in which case we call it loyalty, or bad, and be called prejudice.

To claim that a person cannot be subject to these basic instincts is to deny an aspect of our common humanity. It is, itself, racism.

In some ways oppression arises from oppression. It is not just that oppressed can become oppressor, so much as oppression begets oppression. As violence begets violence. Hutus and Tutsis oppress each other in a repeating cycle of revenge.

Perhaps anyone who thinks the oppressed can never become the oppressor should study the fate of Palestine.

This is not to say there is no such thing as institutional racism. But I do say institutions, and society, do not exist in and of themselves. They are in some way a collective formed from the individuals past and present. A society will not continue to be institutionally racist unless at least some members of the more powerful group are individually racist.

Furthermore, I believe the idea that society is institutionally organised to favour all white people over all people who are not white is to misunderstand how power is organised in our society. For sure white males predominant in the power structure. This does not mean the power structure exists to the benefit of all white males. Or to white people only. Winston Churchill could be defined as an ethnic minority. As could Ian Duncan Smith. Both were leaders of the British Conservative Party.

By many measures, in the UK, poor white males are the group with the worst life chances.

The power structures of the UK are not based around race any more than they are around gender, or around some combination of both. That would be to the advantage of far too large a group.

We are ruled by a much smaller elite. A new aristocracy.

There are white males who think they are on the 'inside'. They fool themselves. They are divided from potential comrades with whom their interests are shared. There are many people who vote against their own economic self interest.

The same goes when privately educated feminists implore poor women to support the agenda of elite females. Doctors and lawyers will benefit far more from free childcare than any cleaner.

This talk of society being a power structure built in favour of all whites, against blacks also divides the oppressed is racist because it divides along lines of race.

The people who promote this thinking are just like white males, they fall into two groups. The elite, and the bitches of the elite.

Bye bye austerity

In case you hadn't noticed, the UK has an election going on.

Paul Krugman delights that this could mean the end of the Austerians. Noting in yesterday's Guardian (30/04/2015), the UK government is about the last in the world where the myth of expansionary austerity is still celebrated.

He notes that a lot of people who have pushed austerity have done so for political, rather than economic, reasons.

The way he voices it is somewhat less cynical than it could have been.

Because while the UK government uses austerity as a political club with which to bludgeon the opposition, it doesn't actually practice it.

The current UK government has comprehensively missed its deficit reduction targets.

After two years of trying austerity, Cameron and Osbourne eventually accepted their policy had failed. They moved to stimulate the housing market as the most ideologically acceptable climbdown for a pair of Conservative right wingers.

Again they promise us lots of pain in the first two ears of the next parliament, followed by an easing up, creating growth in time for the subsequent election.

But now we know even if they did once believe in the silly mantras of Thatcherite economics, experience has taught them how wrong it all is.

Now we know that any cut to social benefits is not for economic, but ideological reasons.

If we vote for them, we will deserve the outcome.

Pity those who will suffer the most for such folly.

Evangelising for Israel

I read today that according to Pew, 82% white evangelical Christians in the US believe that Israel was given to the Jews by God. Whereas only 40% of Jews subscribe to this view.

While this may not surprise us, it is an astounding statistic. All the more astounding for how true it rings.

After all to be Christian is to believe that Jesus Christ was the Messiah, and also to believe that the Jews stand in rejection of him.

To be Evangelical is to believe in an individual duty to preach Jesus to the unconverted.

Apparently, in America, Jewish people have an exemption from evangelism. I can think of a good few people who might want to feign a Jewish background as a result.

This represents a remarkable shift. Jews were routinely persecuted in Europe for several hundred years. Anti Semitism did not stop at the Atlantic's eastern shore, but crossed to the new world. Significant Americans, and significant numbers of ordinary Americans were casually or actively anti Semitic well into the 1970s. The Ku Klux Klan, that barometer of old school racism, peddled hatred of Jews just as easily as hatred of blacks.

But something has changed. If an organisation representing the worst of the extreme right was to be founded today, very likely it would be talking about 'Judeo Christian heritage'. For the right, Jews are no longer part of 'them', rather they are now part of 'us'.

So a Republican candidate, to win the presidential nomination, must seriously love Israel. The question is, will that help them win the election? Like so many hot issues for Republicans in general, and evangelicals in particular, saying what the primary voters want to hear means saying things that ordinary voters think sound insane.

Democracy is a wonderful thing. Grass roots movements like the tea party are amongst the most democratic of all movements. But they are not mainstream. If Republicans don't find a way to get more mainstream candidates past the committed base of Evangelicals, not only will elections be hard to win, but winning them will have consequences. These consequences will be bad news for the Republicans. Governing (if only in part) in the interests of another nation cannot end well. And it must have less than ideal consequences for the US, too. But worst of all, the alliance between the Republican right and Israel is really an alliance between the Republican right and the Israeli right. It isn't even to the benefit of all Israeli Jews.

It seems to me that most educated Americans must know all this. But the train is hurtling down the track and the brakes have failed. No one knows how to stop it.

A new consensus. Is it possible?

In the Democratic world, there was an overall political consensus from the 1930s to the 1970s.

This was a left wing consensus.

It was brought about by the depredations of the great depression. Reinforced by the horror at the handiwork of the extreme right, the Nazis. This consensus oversaw the advancement of the state until it took over half the economy or more.

From the mid 70s onward, this consensus collapsed. The weight of over empowered workers, who misdirected the collectivism of unions into a defence of their own, new vested interest. The corruption of an unholy alliance between the liberal left and the authoritarian apologists for the Soviet Union. The discrediting of nominally leftist leaders, such as Kennedy and Johnson in Vietnam, or Wilson in Rhodesia. The leftists' had become a new elite. A new version of the establishment.

Therefore forces of the right, while maintaining the banner of conservatism, could offer what seemed a new radical approach to politics. So came the alliance of libertarian free marketeers with social conservatism. The idea that freeing a sector of society to get rich would benefit us all. 'A rising tide lifts all boats'. So a second consensus was formed. This entailed the idea that the state was inherently inefficient and should do as little as possible, that all state action stifled enterprise. That tax was evil, wealth, and particularly wealth 'creators' good. All that was need for progress was freedom for employers, and limits on the freedom of workers to organise. This consensus was reinforced by the fall of the Soviet Union, bringing a clutch of new nations into the orbit of the west, nations that would distrust the left and feel nothing but gratitude to the 'Cold Warriors' of the right.

The economic and banking crisis of the last few years leaves this second consensus as tarnished as the first was 35 years ago.

The second consensus was personified by Reagan and Thatcher. But before either of them took office Menachem Begin won election in Israel in 1977. His election ended thirty years of leftists dominance, thirty years that represented the whole life of the state of Israel.

This leaves me wondering, if the left wins in Israel today, does that signal a new leftist consensus is about to spring into being? From Obamacare in the US to economics trumping security in Israel, all the signs are there.

It is the time of the 99%.

UPDATE----

Or maybe not. Netanyahu won, apparently. Israel views itself as a democracy, it therefore gets the government it deserves. One that rejects peace with its neighbours. That was the change Netanyahu made to win. Israel has declared itself to be more the country not of Netanyahu than Ben Gurion. Let it be judged as such..

After oil, shale and isolationism

There has been much talk of the decline of US influence. Conservatives & Neo-Cons blame Obama for being indecisive, or weak. Liberals blame the poisonous legacy of George W Bush.

There are probably a gang of centrists somewhere blaming the unique circumstance of one following the other.

One of the reactions to the fallout from US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq has been 'frack baby frack'. The call for energy independence.

While there are environmental concerns, and green campaigners must despair at the continued reliance on fossil fuel implied, there is a seemingly powerful logic for the US to pursue the shale revolution.

Firstly shale promises to all but eliminate US dependence on the permanently unstable middle east. This is a persuasive argument not just for anyone who favours an isolationist approach to world affairs, but a big slice of Americans who do not want to see their army deployed abroad if at all possible.

Secondly, shale holds out the possibility of a new boom in well paying manual jobs, not just in the actual drilling industry, but also the related supply chain. Manufacturing jobs. This is a vital issue for a whole swathe of Americans. Blue collar people in particular, both Democrats and Tea Partiers

Thirdly, while shale oil and gas are fossil fuels, and there is a risk of groundwater contamination, dependence on coal is inevitably reduced. Exploitation of shale resource will help reduce the US carbon footprint. This may not satisfy people with green issues at the top of their agenda, but it brings many people on side who think Global Warming is an issue, but are somewhat vague on the actual details.

Fourthly, there is a group who may mot think burning fossil fuels is a mortal sin, but still want to preserve what is left of the wilderness, huntsmen, outdoors type people, as well as some environmentalists. They might be happy to avoid drilling up Alaska .Still achieving the goal of relaxing the ban on drilling in the arctic without actually doing so. Namely producing more energy at home.

Fifthly there is the balance of payments.

Last, but by no means least, there is the corporate constituency.

Looking at the list above, the combination of local activists concerned about groundwater combined with people opposed to any extension of fossil fuel dependence were never going to prevail. Perhaps we should take a bit of time to think about that. If poisoning the water supply is not a slamdunk argument, are we inevitably doomed?

Moving swiftly on to the issues that do matter in the society we have built, the arguments for exploitation of shale, both strategic and economic speak of a stronger America.

But what about unintended consequences. Those lamenting declining US influence might wonder what this has to do with shale, but a key plank of global dominance has been the longstanding alliance with Saudi Arabia. Formed at the end of WWII, this alliance is centred on a simple construct, security for oil. Saudi Arabia, coupled with ally Kuwait, acts as a swing producer in the OPEC oil cartel, keeping the price of oil at an acceptable level. In return the US guarantees the security of the Saudis in particular, and the gulf in general.

But the foundation of that deal is now shaking. The invasion of Iraq took place in the face of Saudi opposition. Whatever the intentions o the US, turning a neighbour with whom the Saudis share a border into an Iranian proxy (at best) or even a failed state is not conducive to security, which is the US side of the bargain.

The invasion of Iraq was dubbed as part of the response to the 911 attacks. If it was, it was severely misguided, but it should always be remembered that 15 of the 19 hijackers (not to mention Osama bin Laden himself) were Saudi citizens. So the effect of the Iraq war can be exaggerated, even before then many Saudis were desperately unhappy with the relationship of mutual dependence.

So the US is no longer the guarantor of security it was. If it also no longer needs the oil, the arrangement of 'security for oil' looks dead in the water.

Not everyone will lament the end of that arrangement. But the Middle East remains a massively important strategic location. It is not Obama's perceived 'weakness' which adds to the perceived 'incompetence' of George W Bush, but the indisputable fact that the US is no longer the biggest customer.

The gulf Arabs have been trading for centuries, if not millennia. America's capitalists surely must understand the importance of not offending your biggest customer. Nowadays that means don't mess with China.

The flip side of America's new found energy independence is a loss of influence in the Middle East. You will find rentaquote Neo Cons lamenting Obama's weakness on the one hand while calling for energy independence on the other. They won't tell you that energy independence might be a cause of declining US influence.

The real question for America is 'Does it really matter?'. What is US influence in the Middle East for, if not to guarantee oil supply? Is the focus of world trade moving from the Atlantic to the Pacific? Whatever the political class may think, or pundits tell you, most citizens of the US would swap any amount of world influence for a return to the days of steadily rising incomes.

Perhaps the effects will be felt more in the Middle East than in America. In the Gulf, in Egypt, perhaps even in Israel.

Ukraine, war or appeasement?

The Western world looks at Ukraine like a slow motion train crash.

Here is a country in Europe on the borders of the EU being slowly dismembered.

We do nothing.

Problem is, what can we do? The options are pretty simple.

We do nothing, and hope that Putin's Russia will then be, in the words of Bismarck, a 'satiated power'.

We tool up for war, knowing this will be a confrontation between Russia and the West.

We keep on talking, indulging in a game of bluff. Pretending that we will actually do something.

All of the above include the ever present, nearly always ineffectual, economic sanctions.

Almost everyone thinks that nothing is unacceptable. And I can understand why. Appeasement does not have a good track record anywhere, let alone central Europe. But is the 'do nothing' option really appeasement? I'm not so sure. Appeasement generally involves a lot of talking. Plenty of diplomacy, and the crafting of an agreement which reflects whatever facts on the ground an aggressor has created.

It is really the third option that is appeasement.

In the final analysis there is only one question. Are we prepared to send our sons and daughters to die in the name of Ukrainian freedom? It is a stark question because we face a stark choice: the alternative to doing nothing is to fight.

For me the answer is no. I am not prepared to die for Ukrainian freedom. Nor to send my children to.

It appears that Russian is prepared to sacrifice her children in this fight. There is no amount of diplomacy, sanctions, negotiations, agreements which can bridge this gap.

We can acquiesce with words of condemnation. It may seem weak, but it is at least honest. Endless rounds of talks to legitimise a limited annexation of Crimea, Donbas, Mariupol etc. that is what appeasement looks like. That is what Chamberlain did in Munich.

All the talk of agreements and ceasefires in Minsk. All our threats of arming Ukraine, committing ourselves to Ukrainian freedom, unless we are prepared to sacrifice our children, it is nothing but a game of bluff.

Sometime great poker players can win a game of bluff. Perhaps Merkel or Obama fit that mould. But no one, however great a player, can truly win a game of bluff when the other side is for real.

I really don't think Mr Putin is bluffing. Everything he has done so far is a bit more extreme than we Westerners expected. He really does mean to recapture a slice of his near abroad.

We may not be prepared to intervene to stop him, but neither should we legitimise that with an agreement in exchange for a commitment to stop at some new, arbitrary border.

Feminism, Masculism and the PUA 'community'

On line there had been a lot of chatter about PUA people. This acronym stands for pick up artist. This is all about the idea that a man can learn a technique get a whole load of women into bed.

While many a young male might benefit from a bit of advice on interacting with women from an older more experienced guy, the sort of advice on offer from PUA people really is stunningly, awfully, bizarrely bad.

Feminists have therefore targeted these people on line, and in real life, with lots of trolling, picketing and the like.

It is all pretty unsavoury. And, being anonymous here, I thought I might make a few observations.

Firstly, there is a whole pseudo scientific philosophical basis to this PUA thing, and it is about grounded in science as new earth creationism. There is a base assumption that there are 'alpha' and 'beta' males. I am not really aware of any research into this in human interaction, but even if it could be shown to be true, any given male would only ever be 'alpha' for a limited period of his life. He would be dependent on his father and later his son (in law) for protection much of the time. Any man who is honest will acknowledge that real men exhibit both alpha and beta behaviour (such that it exists) many times in a single day. Besides, the behaviour promoted by the PUA people, that is, a whole string of casual sexual liaisons, is not alpha behaviour at all, but beta. Alphas stick around to raise their offspring, giving their genetic offspring the best start, and best opportunity of becoming alpha themselves. The behaviour promoted by PUA is more like the lone wolf, any old blues guy could tell you that is beta.

Anyone who has been out with a bunch of guys know there is always one or two who turn women's heads. Whatever the PUA guys tell you, this is not to do with the way they behave (although confidence is always attractive, and arrogance a big turn off), how they look or whatever. but pheremones do have a role to play. If you want to be attractive, search 'Boar mate'. Seriously, this has been tested, it is better than any aftershave, or PUA course. Won't get you laid, but it might get you to a first date. Thirdly the view of women is mind boggling.


By now most of us can imagine there are people who think men are hunters and women 'prey'. But the scientific evidence is kind of different. Human males have much bigger balls and penises than their gorilla or chimpanzee counterparts. There is a scientific reason. Bigger balls make more sperm, this is needed because unlike gorilla's and chimpanzees, there is a certain amount of natural female promiscuity  in humans. That is not to say all women are 'sluts', but the idea of the little innocent angel sitting at home is just as ridiculous as the whole slut thing. Alpha guys need bigger balls to produce lots of sperm to flood out the sperm of the beta guys, you know, those PUA people.

But why the bigger cocks? Well, there is only one real reason. Display. So women can see them. That has a very interesting implication. It is women that control the mating game. It is women that make the choice of mate. The idea that men 'compete' for females, and take them as prey, or a harem, is just societal bullshit. Guess what, women can get laid pretty easily. It really is pretty easy to find a guy that wants a fuck, check any dating website. Women get to choose.

For interesting insights into natural human sexual behaviour search the 'secret life of sperm'.

Which brings me to the feminist response to all this turd. Which is nearly as baffling. Feminists seem to be a collection of people specialising in group think. They talk amongst themselves and construct a model of reality against which they argue, and the real world continues unperturbed by what goes on in this bubble. I  only ever heard about PUAs from feminists, yet some think this is average male behaviour and thought. For feminists, feminism is a good thing, but masculism (a word I have only heard from feminists) is the opposite. A bad thing. Where has the fight for equality gone?

The argument against the PUA people is based on the idea that it is part of 'rape culture', that it encourages abuse of women. This may be true. It probably is. But it is a secondary abuse. In the same way that women's magazines have denigrated women by promoting a dystopian unachievable image of the female form, creating a crisis of body image, so the PUA abuse young men by creating a false, unattainable, dystopian image of what it means to be a man. If young men react by lashing out, they do bear responsibility for whoever gets hit, but the first abuse by the PUA people is of young men.

I also see a parallel between the notion offered by feminists that women could 'have it all' to that offered by the PUA to young men. Folks, you never do get to have your cake and eat it. Women marching into the workplace means they must, necessarily, cede ground at home. It is not possible to be the ever present, attentive mother and a career woman. Not without a time machine. This talk of juggling work and home, that is what men have always done. The PUA also offer a great contradiction. The whole idea of 'playing the field' is to find an ideal partner. To still be 'playing the field' at 40, whatever a feminist or PUA guy might tell you, is just incredibly sad.

There are women who argue sensibly against the PUA abuse of young males, and who can see the contradiction in 'feminism good, masculism bad', but they are not the core voice of feminism. Nor are they likely to be in the near future. Did I mention I only heard about the whole PUA thing from feminists? Check out the 'Narcissism of small differences'.

To be clear, I believe in the equal worth of all people. I'm not sure all feminists do, and the PUA people also seem to have a very low opinion of men.

USAid in Cuban Twitter

The tortured story of the relationship between the US and Cuba takes another twist.

For the record, the US spent some several million dollars setting up a local Cuban version of twitter. Called 'Zunzuneo', Cuban slang for the noise of a humming bird. US govt loyalists are at pains to point out this was not 'covert'. Meaning it does not meet the official definition of a covert operation. But the action was clearly a long way from overt. It was hidden.

For some strange reason, the US just can't help but interfere in Cuba. And for a similarly obscure reason, it always seems to go wrong.

There is a shrill defensive tone to many that work in USAid as they seek to justify this operation.

They point out it was not, strictly speaking, covert. That USAid DOES have a mandate for promotion of democracy, and this is in that line.

They admit there may have been problems in implementation, that the contractor needs looking at.

But there is a failure to acknowledge any problem with the action itself.

This sort of attitude betrays a real problem at the heart of recent US relationships with much of the world.

When the US tried to assassinate Castro with an exploding cigar, that was probably illegal. But it was done by the CIA. We expect that sort of thing from them.

We expect USAid to be feeding the hungry, educating the poor.

When USAid is used as a means to promote America's image abroad, that is inevitable. When it is used as a weapon, that is something which discredits an otherwise exceedingly creditable mission.

There are many in the US diplomatic community who fail to acknowledge this. I am not sure if they are being deliberately obtuse, showing loyalty beyond their own reason, or they really are so myopic that they cannot see the damage done by using aid for something which should really be a CIA operation.

In short, this operation was bloodless. Compared to drones and assassinations it was really pretty cool. Enabling people to communicate, what's the harm.

Had this been a CIA operation, it would have been a plus for America.

As a USAid op, it is a massive minus.

If the US govt cannot see that, their loss of global influence will continue.

Crimea, annexed from Ukraine by Putin

The forces of the Russian federation have annexed the Crimean peninsula.

Always something of a Russian enclave in Ukraine, the region retained the naval base for the Russian Black Sea fleet after the break up of the Soviet Union. Such international arrangements, where sovereignty over a city is ambiguous, or when the citizens of a region are ethnically, culturally or linguistically closely associated with a neighbouring state, are rarely stable.

The internal republics of the Soviet Union were riddled with these ambiguities. Quite a few were deliberately manufactured on the old imperial tradition of 'divide and rule'. Populations and regions were shifted from one administrative region to another as punishment for an official or the collective.

And so we have Transnistria, a Slavic bit of Moldova; Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Russian bits of Georgia; Nagorno Karabakh, an Armenian region of Azerbaijan; Samarkand, in Uzbekistan but closely associated with Tajikistan and the Fergana valley which crosses Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan; all potential flashpoints.

The Russian claim to Crimea could be seen as having a similar basis to the British claim to Northern Ireland. Sure, it might geographically belong to someone else, but the people there are of the Motherland. In the old, declining imperial power the elite must act to retain credibility in front of its own populace.

However there are differences, in that Britain did not so much invade Northern Ireland, as cling to it when  the rest of Ireland broke away. It would have been a better parallel if Russia retained Crimea at the break up of the Soviet Union.

So, Crimea really has been annexed. Unilaterally taken from one state by another. I'm not sure when this last happened in Europe, but it reminds me of the German reoccupation of the Rhineland. The Russian claim is good, but what they should have done is demand a referendum. Assertion of their claim via military might establishes a very worrying precedent.

The West will do nothing (outside of a few economic sanctions) because the West can do nothing. The last time Britain fought a war in Crimea they were close to the height of their imperial power, allied with France and the Ottomans and still it didn't turn out too well. There is no chance of a reversal here.

There was much speculation that Putin would let Ukraine go, waiting for inevitable financial troubles to bring them back into line. I conclude this failed to recognise the importance of these events to Putin's regime. Putin's pitch to his people is that he has halted the decline of Russia. The departure of Ukraine from the fold with a second revolution in a decade would have fatally undermined his narrative. Decline would have been on-going. However much of a gamble this looks, post Syria, Putin's confidence is high. For him, too much was at stake. The risk of inaction seemed small compared to the risk of action.

The rouble can fall, Russia is only too happy to default on its debt. Can the West cope with that? Stocks can fall, that is a buying opportunity. But Sevastopol and the Black Sea fleet? If that falls, it is over the dead body of the Putin regime.

What is Europe anyway? Ask the Ukrainians....

Europe is not really a continent, geographically speaking.

Continents are meant to be defined by tectonic plates. But Europe is just a peninsula of the massive Eurasian Tectonic plate.

India, called a subcontinent, has its own plate. As does Arabia. Much of central America sits on the Caribbean plate, rather than the North American or South American.

So Europe is really not a geographical entity. What, then, is it?

It is sometimes assumed that the distinction is racial, that Europe is where the white people came from. There is little basis for that view in history. Europa was a figure of Greek legend. Pretty soon the term Europe came to have a geographical meaning, which by the middle ages was taken to be the area where the Roman Church held sway.

That is the boundaries of Europe were defined by the Mediterranean (with Islam the majority belief to the south) and the Orthodox Christians to the East, and the Ottoman empire (including modern Greece and much of the Balkans) to the South East.

The world 'Europe' was not much in use, however. Christendom was the term of choice.

Only after the reformation, when the power of the Roman church was broken in large parts of Western Europe did the word 'Europe' come to the fore.

So Europe is a cultural place.

And it is not fixed. Greece rejected Roman papal authority back in 1053. It has not returned to the fold. But from a modern secular perspective Greece is viewed as the cradle of all European civilisation. It was only in the 19th century, during the reign of Westward leaning Tsar Peter the Great that Europe extended far enough east to include the Russian heartland. Although as early as the sixth century BC some Greeks had located the boundary between Europe and Asia somewhere in the Caucasus.

Sometimes people who are not really European attempt to define themselves as such, in order to make a political statement about what they want to be.

Therefore secular Turks will often describe Turkey as a 'European nation', when almost all definitions of Europe would place the country something more than 95% in Asia. The aforementioned Peter the Great shifted his capital to the West as part of an attempt to Europeanise his nation.

It is in this light that I would view the current struggle in Ukraine. Poland, a Catholic country, has a long history of Europeanism. It was the first country in Europe (since ancient times) to elect its head of state. Many Ukrainians see Poland as their closest neighbour. Russia, a big, Orthodox country, with a lot of money and oil, is seen by many other Ukrainians as their natural partner.

This division is often reinforced by language. With Russian being the majority tongue in the industrial East, Ukrainian in the West. But bearing in mind the religious definition of the middle ages Europe the religious divide, where Western Ukrainians traditionally accepted the authority of the pope (although much of their traditions look somewhat eastern, allowing priests to marry for instance). Eastern Ukrainians remained Orthodox, under the authority of the Patriarch of Moscow. The East much earlier became part of the Russian empire, the West under the authority of the Habsburgs or Poland.

In the same way that an ancient European divide, across the Alps, between North and South seems to have reopened in the financial crisis, so too has another divide, between east and west. This latter divide being both ancient and modern.

In the unambiguous West; London, Paris, Washington, Frankfurt, Milan, Madrid, Europe seems pretty much broken and crisis ridden. Nationalism is at the fore to a greater extent than at any time since the second world war. The brief moment at the end of the cold war when Europe looked like it might become a world wide player dissolved in the forming of a post Kyoto G2 consensus.

Whatever it is that unites Europe, is, as ever, overwhelmed by the divisions. In 1914 the Emperors in Berlin and Moscow were both cousins of the Emperor in London. That did not prevent the beginning of an internal European conflict that would destroy European power, propelling the aptly named United States to the role of Global hegemon.

Yet on the streets of Kiev people are willing to die for whatever it is they think Europe is. I have met Israelis and Turks who think joining 'Europe' is their dream.

For these people, being the of 51st state of the USA is unpalatable as an alternative. Europe is their dream. But, as ever, it remains a dream. An ideal. It is 100 years since Europe tore itself apart in the first world war. All attempts at unity since have ended in failure.

It seems the people of Europe forget the cost of their division. In refusing to learn from the past, it is to be hoped Europe does not doom itself to a repeat. For if they cannot learn to live together as brothers, they may well die together as fools.

Bono, philanthropy and taxes

Bono berates us all for the poverty of Africa.

Yet he doesn't pay his taxes, quoting the Gospel of Saint Matthew:- “Let not the left hand know what the right hand does.”

Someone should tell Bono the full quote:-

"But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth".

This teaching does not provide cover to those wishing to avoid their tax liability. It instructs them to keep quiet about what they give to the poor. It specifically tells the like of Bono to shut their big mouths.

Bono would do better to give to Caesar (the state) what is his, all that filthy lucre.

And when it comes to morality, a humble and broken heart is what God requires.

Merkel in Germany

Angela Merkel and her Christian Democrats have had a good election. 42% of the vote.

Some right wing Eurosceptics got close to representation with over 4% (In Germany, you need a minimum of 5% to get ant representatives into parliament).

But her coalition partners (the Free Democrats) slipped below 5%.

So, Merkel has no one on the right to form a coalition with.

Other people in parliament include the SPD (socialist/social democratic) Green and Lefists.

Between them they have 43% plus.

This is a great result for Merkel, but I do not believe it is quite the kind of result the British media says it is.

Firstly, the leftists and the rightists are pretty much neck and neck. The SPD has not done well, neither have the greens, that makes the German electorate look pretty much left wing, all other things considered.

Secondly, Merkel's victory is more a conquest of the German right than it is of the German electorate. 42% is a great result for the CDU/CSU alliance. But that is the sum of all the parliamentary parties of the right. This is a personal victory for Merkel, not a victory for the right.

Thirdly the British see this election result as a shift to Euro-scepticism, a rejection of the elitist euro agenda. But the Eurosceptic right wingers (AfD) scored as poorly as the Free Democrats.

You could more easily style this result as a rejection of free market neo liberalism as a rejection of Europe. After all, it is a victory for Ms Merkel, who has committee to saving the Euro.

The left is split, with many voters going to the left of the centrist SPD. The greens ran on higher taxes. The SPD leadership was lacklustre. Almost no one goes to the right of Merkel.

Someone from the German left will need to work with the CDU.

If the German left can find itself a leader, it is well positioned for the next election.

Overpopulation of Malthusians

There is a conventional wisdom that we are heading to disaster because here are just too man of us.

That we really are undergoing a population explosion.

And if we don't take some sort of drastic action, there will pretty soon not be enough food to go around.

One of the earlier guys to record such an opinion was Rev Thomas Malthus, way back around 1800.

But the evidence does not support such a view.

Not only is there more than enough food in the world to feed everybody, but the nations where people starve are more often than not food exporters. People starve because food is not shared. And because rich countries demand debt payments take precedence over full stomachs.

Furthermore, the rate of population growth has been slowing for around 50 years. Population is falling in China and in Europe. Population is stable in North America. The years of rapid growth are over in Southern Africa and South America.

Only in some parts of the Islamic world does population continue to rapidly expand.

The UN estimates population will cease to grow, and begin to decline, around the year 2100.

More recent estimates are for peak population in the year 2050.

Just think, over half the people alive today will likely live to witness peak population. The issues facing the world are not those of ever expanding population, but of an aging population.

Fascism in Europe

Germany has been pretty cautious throughout the Euro crisis, and there are good reasons for this German caution.

Firstly Germany is a democracy, and the voters are feeling pretty cautious. As would the voters of any other country that was being asked to bail out its neighbours.

Secondly there is an election coming. In four days' time.

But also there are other reasons, specific to German history. Because of the second world war, there is still something of a guilt complex in the national psyche. And because of the terrible suffering of the 1930s depression, there is a terrible fear of inflation.

These two things are linked. It is true that Germany was probably affected worse than any other western nation by the great depression, but that is not the only reason the Germans fear inflation. The chaos of the great depression, allied with a ruling elite discredited and largely dispossessed by the disaster of losing world war one, is what left the door ajar for the Nazis in the first place.

So it is not some Nazi like sense of superiority that makes Germany so reluctant to bet the farm on rescuing southern Europe so much as the fearful folk memory of the disaster that unfolded last time the country lost control of its economy.

This is very difficult to understand from a British perspective. I am over 40, I cannot remember a time when I thought we did have control of our economy. Nor point to any such time in the last century.

But today we look south towards Greece, where they have had a real fascist style political assassination. The authorities dress it up as an argument over a football match, but really Golden Dawn have sent a mob down there to cover a premeditated attack.

Now figures on the left speak of 'banning' Golden Dawn. What idiocy. People are turning to Golden Dawn from a sense of hopelessness and alienation. How will 'banning' them help? Will it make the political system more inclusive? Will it spread hope?

There is a potential tragedy unfolding before our eyes. That is in its fear of the fascism of the past, Germany enforces an austerity on Southern Europe which, rather than saving us from the 1930s, creates a new fascism of the 21st century.

Perhaps Ms Merkel can alter course after the election. Perhaps the German electorate will swing further to the left than anyone expects. The tragedy is not yet complete. But we need a change in direction to avoid it. I cannot see that change can come from Greece, or from anywhere other than Germany.

Democracy in the UK

It may seem strange to anyone who is a long term resident here, but we have had an outbreak of democracy.

The executive decided that we should go to war.

They consulted parliament.

Parliament said no.

War is cancelled.

In terms of geopolitics, this is probably something of a non event. It will not have much impact on any US decision to attack Syria or not. And the UK contribution is small enough to be negligible.

For years we British thought that our army was the best in the world. Then we were humiliated in Basra and Helmand. That has taught the sane amongst us that we are not so special.

We have to adjust to the newly perceived reality. Even if our leaders can't perceive it.

It seems our parliament can.

For the first time since Vietnam, the UK will not join the US in a military adventure.

For the first time since Suez the parliamentary opposition has opposed the government on military action.

For the first time since 1782 the government has los such a vote. To put that in context, the Americans had yet to win their revolutionary war back then.

This may not be a great geopolitical event, but in UK terms it is seismic. We are no longer first in the queue for military action or for backing the Americans.

We might even develop an independent foreign policy.