tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post3567354411430765869..comments2023-10-14T13:18:37.330+01:00Comments on angels in marble: This is No Time for a Leaderhatfield girlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12673905475452420002noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-86402257465561382392010-01-17T16:43:03.943+00:002010-01-17T16:43:03.943+00:00Raedwald, ND and you are the best of bloggers, N. ...Raedwald, ND and you are the best of bloggers, N. But you are all writing in stolen time. That's the trouble with earning your living, it's a very time consuming activity. All those driven Russian novelists - didn't know they were born.<br /><br />Chicken pox over then. The smalls must be in nursery school now. Your oldest son setting out, reading for himself. Only 15 more years. :)hatfield girlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12673905475452420002noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-60320659930596354572010-01-17T00:30:55.779+00:002010-01-17T00:30:55.779+00:00That really is quite superb HG I have not looked ...That really is quite superb HG I have not looked in for a while ,or into Raedwald ,or your gaff and I see what I have been missing on both counts . You have got even better and you were always a mesmerising writer <br />I am not at all sure you are right that this country does not need a leader though or at least a secure and strongly mandated administration shall we say, its more a question of which one for me but that’s a rather different matter .<br /><br />I do hope all is well wherever you are , I have just navigated through three lots of chicken pox which is the low level problem I generally apply myself to nowadays . For some reason it has lodged in my mind that you had a mild interest in Mussolini . Having recently read a history of the period I have been staggered at how wrongly I had perceived him and how generally popular and respected he was. So muich so that the original lyrics to the Cole Porter Classic you’re the Tops was <br /><br />You`re The Top <br />You`r the great Houdini <br />You`re the top[<br />You are Mussolini <br /><br />It stayed that way for years without any objection <br /><br />Tara <br /><br />XXNewmaniahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11922161971821380803noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-56820368031145688012010-01-16T11:54:53.170+00:002010-01-16T11:54:53.170+00:00Talwin, thank you. We came to this partly from un...Talwin, thank you. We came to this partly from unintended consequences, but there is a literature on the 'long march through the institutions', as you know. <br /><br />ND is right, the marchers have been moving for many years before 1997. I think 1997 was when they reached their destination. Reading Frances Morrell's obituary, which reminds us of what was going on in the teaching unions and in the old ILEA, is a good example of all this.hatfield girlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12673905475452420002noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-9785044321590304372010-01-16T11:47:22.136+00:002010-01-16T11:47:22.136+00:00Many thanks Yacht.
Mr Optimist, we all recognise ...Many thanks Yacht.<br /><br />Mr Optimist, we all recognise the 'leader and father of the people' model even if, up till 1997, we were sensible enough not accept any attempt to instal it in our democracy.hatfield girlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12673905475452420002noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-10364035216871166792010-01-16T11:43:35.568+00:002010-01-16T11:43:35.568+00:00You are very kind ND. The intimidation of the civ...You are very kind ND. The intimidation of the civil service has been accompanied by its quality decline, itself the result of ill thought through attacks upon 'privilege'. There's a reason why a competitive-entry civil service takes many of its higher grades from a narrow university band. Very short degree structures - only 24 weeks for only two years and a half in many degrees, necessarily cover a lot of ground fast, while relying on input from the general educational culture of the undergraduate. Arrive on a first rate degree course and any undergraduate with a prior impoverished education is going to have to read very hard for their degree as well as acquire from the start technical skills that others have already- languages, rhetorical command, skills in forms of argument, evidence evaluation, statistical competence and, presumably, other skills for pure science or engineering degrees. Pile on top of this the civil service practice of giving responsibility right from the beginning of service, then recruiting under a policy-driven 'fair and representative' system with privilege handicaps, and the civil service becomes itself much less able, certainly at policy-making and decision-taking advisory levels, and needs to put out what used to be its own work. All of this is made worse by interfering in the entry requirements for the universities; plus the great expansion in the areas of government activity. A lot of the rogue Labour destruction isn't conspiracy driven intention - it's uncomprehending incompetence. It's not that civil servants can't be recruited from all sorts of backgrounds, they were; but the recruiting began at a much earlier stage in poorer people's lives. Yet now state schools have national curriculums that downgrade central elements of a good general education. <br /><br />And of course you're right about the truly competent simply shutting up in the face of politics overriding properly marshalled evidence. <br /><br />This class war stuff from Labour is being expressed very vulgarly at the moment - toff bashing etc., when the rejection of inconvenient understanding has been a basic tool of rogue Labour always.hatfield girlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12673905475452420002noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-56877375911417563842010-01-16T08:30:59.466+00:002010-01-16T08:30:59.466+00:00Fine, thought provoking stuff. Cameron should read...Fine, thought provoking stuff. Cameron should read this. <br /><br />However, the piece prompts the thought that things are so bad they can't change much any time soon.<br /><br />How did we come to this?talwinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06217305295002230599noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-71679079677824673862010-01-15T23:57:00.241+00:002010-01-15T23:57:00.241+00:00What a well argued post. I also ponder these ques...What a well argued post. I also ponder these questions. My thought is that a certain level of honesty is required of our leaders. If they are genuinely willing to use public funds to offer to protect the electorate from damage and threat (even if they have caused much of it) and can show that a large part of the electorate will gain from this exchange (i.e that someone else will pay) and over the years, they have disempowered us - well ...Grumpy Optimisthttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-48874546847806125392010-01-15T08:36:41.007+00:002010-01-15T08:36:41.007+00:00Excellent post, thank you.Excellent post, thank you.Weekend Yachtsmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04262853091154005651noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2956830097495837473.post-70452896120385574382010-01-14T16:58:35.904+00:002010-01-14T16:58:35.904+00:00fine essay HG
just a quibble: whilst Thatcher was...fine essay HG<br /><br />just a quibble: whilst Thatcher was 110% justified in crushing Galtieri & the miners (and Murdoch the print unions) she formed a very dim view of due (Civil Service) process that went <i>well</i> beyond the needs of 'war', IMHO <br /><br />This had two baleful effects (a) as you say, it impressed and informed NuLab; <br /><br />but also, (b) it emasculated the Civil Service itself, which became unable to trust its own judgment, or even carry out in-depth analysis of its own (and therefore perpetually sought ratification from favoured consultancies) - long before 1997<br /><br />then came NuLab with its insistence on media management via imposition of detailed narrative fictions, policed with totalitarian insistence (if not methods) and disregard for truth or decency - which has taken a further toll on the Civil Service (as well as fundamently lowering the standard of public political discourse)<br /><br />I deal with these people, and I am sure you do too: they are high- but hollowed-out intellects, afraid of independent thought or judgment, permanently in fear of crushing political rebuke from spiteful, moronic SPADs<br /><br />your Reformation lacks the vital executive instrument of a confident and capable Civil Service that knows the meaning of truth! and to think, Britain was the nation whose bureaucracy was trusted worldwide above all othersNick Drewhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13670594203660051701noreply@blogger.com