Diane Abbott offers a perspective on the Labour Conference which won’t feature in the press releases. Her description of conferences in the 1970s sound rather like my experience of the Green Conference a fortnight ago, on a larger scale. Her description of New Labour’s conferences sound exactly as I’d expect.

It hardly needs to be mentioned that the British pro-war coalition (a mixture of the most loathsome and internecine members of the left, along with a few gullible sops such as Johann Hari and, of course, the usual jingoist rightists) has shrunk and collapsed. Support for the war has tanked heavily over the past few years and reduced into a pale shadow of the former polarity that left the country so heavily divided that Radio 1 denied Hot Hot Heat’s best song the coverage it deserved due to its title and chorus being a reference to “Bandages”.

Anti-war sentiment, meanwhile, has swollen. The increasing crescendo of dissent was easily the largest single factor in driving Blair from office and without this ultimate, unforgivable betrayal there is little doubt that Labour would be in a far superior position to the predicament that they find themselves in. Had Michael Howard opposed the War there would be a sliver of a chance that he would be Prime Minister today, but its unquestionable that Labour would have taken an even greater pounding. As it is the Conservative’s inability to attack Blair properly upon the war (being able to attack the fashion in which it was conducted but not its existence) hindered them heavily and their failure to provide the opposition expected of them ensured that it took another few years and a total re-branding for them to grasp the public consciousness.

Whereas previously a deep commitment to opposition had filled many with conviction to end it (the largest protest in British history serves as an obvious indication of as much) the abatement of this apoplexy has been accompanied with the broadening of anti-war views. It is now only die-hards such as the ones SES censors all mention of that keep the line firm. Most of the Guardianistas, all of Hari and the rest have abandoned their former backing and grown contrite. Matthew Parris described this process as the sinking of the good ship Neo-con almost two years ago. By now the process is through. A scattered handful remain, fit only for being subjected to ridicule by radical socialists and squabbling over which Presidential candidate to back: all out behind the war and back the reactionary or throw your chips for Obama and his progressive vigour on all matters, bound to crush your love-child underfoot.

But this division is of greater significance than the group it tears apart: for in America one party’s de facto leader is a man who reckons that the war is “One that should never have been authorised and should never have been waged.” Now there is a position which there is no mistaking the conviction of. Although he has since mixed this stance with a displeasing nationalist smudge of the suggestion that Americans should “Stop rebuilding their country and start rebuilding our own” his core position seems sound.

As heartening as this is, should we not pause for a moment to reflect upon how strange it is that no such voice exists within Britain? Or rather, no such firm tones and intentions are anywhere matched by the actual possibility of the speaker coming to power. The Labour Party are of course crippled over this issue by their own conduct, with Brown incapable of speaking out over the issue as the inevitable retort “Where were you with these words when it mattered?” would snap him. The Conservatives are led, once again, by a war backer and he shows no signs of revoking his former position. So far as can be determined the line is jingoism as usual, despite the vast requirements that this makes upon the state which the Tories supposedly want to reduce the role and size of (funny how rightists always overlook military spending, even for totally superfluous and massively expensive measures such as Trident. Or, for that matter, the equally useless and even more pricey Iraq War.). The Liberal Democrats used to be a bastion of war opposition, as well as a sponge for disaffected Labour voters in 2005. But at present they are led by Nick Clegg, who seems to follow Menzies Campbell (who had a considerable amount of foreign policy experience) in issuing a muffled silence over the matter. He may well be firmly opposed to the invasion and subsequent occupation, it would not surprise me at all, but as of yet I have heard not a word of it from him.

The Greens and BNP, along perhaps with UKIP (I hopefully can be forgiven for not being bothered enough to check out their view, nor that of Veritas) are or were against the war. The Scottish exceptoin is a substantial one but strictly local (or if the SNP get their way, strictly foreign). George Galloway got a seat out of it (before the “Coalition” he rode collapsed multiple times). But this is scant consolation. In 2004 the Green Party of America was against the war and secured beneath a single percentage point in the presidential election and no national seats anywhere. Now the head of the Democratic Party, which claimed both houses in 2006 largely on the back of weariness of the war, and the most likely candidate to win opposes it strongly. That is the sort of four year progress I would anticipate of Britain. That would match the groundswell towards war opposition which has occurred in that time.

But, as I ask whenever someone suggests an “Anyone but Miliband” candidate claiming Labour victory, where is the name? Nobody in British politics shares a vigorous opposition to the War and the possibility of ending up anywhere important. Even the aforementioned most-likely-next-Labour-leader has done a grand total of nothing to end the war in his position of Foreign Secretary. Nobody inside the government or out seems up to the task and after the massive swing towards opposition this is not so much puzzling and disappointing as baffling and intolerable. Must the war serve only as a hindrance for those who backed it and never as an opportunity for those that did not? Is there no one willing to seize the chance to end it immediately and ride with this willingness to power?

If not we shall have to settle into the awkward position of being substantially to the right of America. At best we shall be dragged out along with them. So perhaps we should take heart in noting that either way the jingoist nationalists will be mildly humiliated. Which is, once again, scant consolation.

Superb coverage of the Angola elections from Unstrung is on offer to all interested. They seem to be in a similar position to South Africa: democratically sealed hegemony, with a single party’s power ensuring that the standard strength of accountability featured within the democratic system is not in evidence.

Shocking news as anarchist activists near the Republican National Convention are mass arrested in a raid that was seemingly over nothing. Glenn Greenwald has coverage here and the group victim to the raids is giving updates here.

The story is startlingly similar to this event, where the Italian did their best to stamp out peaceful protest. Its also worth, once again, urging you to watch this and see how the police here in Britain treat those that protest.

All of this leads me to the conclusion that police force’s across the parts of the world that really have no excuse have taken to attempting to smash people organising peaceful towards a political end instead of doing their goddamn job of making sure that nobody gets hurt. What redress we can have for this tendency is uncertain, but for the time being we should at least watch. Perhaps even protest…

That year has been endlessly referenced across the entirety of the media. But the events which preceded the Summer of Love were the Spring of Prague. It seems to me that the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia bears far more historical assonances with this year, forty years on, than the revolutionary joy that the Anglosphere enjoyed a few months later.

Which is unfortunate on more levels than I can bear express.

A Press Release from Caroline Lucas floated its way into my in-box yesterday. It provides ample illustration of (one of) the reasons I intend to vote for her:

“We need to double the number of Councillors we have over the next few years. We need to find the next generation of Green councillors.

“We need to create the next Green success, like Norwich, Brighton, Lancaster and Oxford.

“Where we are established like Liverpool, Bristol, Cambridge and Solihull, we need our council groups to grow and set the agenda. We need to give Green councillors the help to succeed.

“Rural successes in Stroud and St Ives need to be repeated.

“Many cities, like Newcastle, Durham and Cardiff could easily have Green councillors and Green MPs. We need people to join and help us win elections to these councils.

“We need new members to join, and we need to actively invite community activists to join. The Green Party is the natural home for anyone who stands up for their local community, local jobs and services: that’s what the Green Party is all about.

“Often the best way to fight for your local community is to get elected and hit your opponents where it hurts: in the ballot box.”

This is all perfectly true. Local politics affects people as much as anything that occurs at a national level, and often faster and more visibly. If we want to change lives, then we need to win seats on councils across the country.

And if we want to make that change national, then we still need to build that support up locally. People will only vote for Green MPs if they know Greens will make their lives better; and, in many ways, the best way to show them that is to break into the council chamber and stand for them. Our strongest hopes for the next General Election - Brighton Pavillion, Norwich South, Lewisham Deptford - all have highly active and vocal council groups. Voters give Greens a chance on the council, and then they cast their verdict in subsequent elections, local and national. So, if we want MPs, we need councillors first.

Lucas clearly understands that. Her site suggests she knows what the Green Party must do if it’s ever to enact the radical policies that make it different; get Greens in office. That task needs work from the grassroots to convince voters to back us, as this release argues.

Also; that bloggers received this release is instructive, I feel. The leadership elections have been very good to Greens with an interest in the new media. Both leadership candidates maintain blogs or interactive websites, as does Adrian Ramsay and most GPEX candidates. The past week saw Jim Jepps host online hustings for GPEX positions and the leadership. So, the candidates have been willing to engage their electorate in detailed and meaningful dialogue, over the internet; a far cry from the token YouTube videos Labour’s deputy leadership elections last year produced. I feel encouraged.

As a wannabe web nerd, I spend some time browsing professional Wordpress theme designs.  Today I spent some time mocking up a design for my own website, which I will begin building in the next few days.  It was with interest, then, to find that the much-trumpeted Number10 website has been unveiled - built on Wordpress!  Get Gordon, all trendy and open source!  Just today I read an article by a blogger on the problems with pushing Wordpress too far beyond a simple blog format, trying to decide whether the platform can really cope with uses beyond those which it was designed for.  In short, I love Wordpress and am happy to mould it to suit any purpose, but the kind of site at Number10 should really be on a more robust content management system.

(I suspect at this point that most readers will not care greatly about the intricacies of Wordpress as a publishing system, so I shall leave the issue aside.)

The visual identity of the site is remarkably different to the old one.  What was once a practical website that looked as if it was created by a team of civil servants with solid scripting knowledge, but little eye for design, is now reasonably professional but not remotely official-looking.  It feels like the website for a small business, not the gateway to the seat of power.  But the simplicity and closeness is not necessarily a bad thing.  The colour scheme works well, and the use of white space is a stark contrast to the overbearing mass of information dumped by the previous incarnation.

This is genuinely web2.0.  Not only is it open source in software, it fully integrates feeds from Flickr, Twitter and YouTube.  This is, really, everything that WebCameron is not.  Where WebCameron is lacking, Number10 shows the Tories how it is done.  But where WebCameron works, this is too poor a comparison to look like an imitation.  There is no original blog content from the PM himself - why use easy-as-pie Wordpress if nobody is actually blogging?  And why on earth is all of the video contained in a TelegraphTV-style media centre instead of being embedded into articles?  Fundamentally, though, why use blogging software if there is no facility to comment?

This could have been a great break for government to reach into new media.  To get the public’s attention where it is of most value - on the internet.  I have long argued for the internet as being massively more important for government than any other media source, including television and newspapers, and this site relaunch was the perfect opportunity for government to wake up.  But they are still slumbering.

The gesture of using Wordpress is thoroughly unnecessary.  There is no good reason for using a blogging platform for the kind of content the Number10 website hosts.  If the website were to contain blogs, or even comments under articles, Wordpress would be perfect.  But for the kind of use Number10 has, Wordpress is simply the wrong package to choose (even from the open source options available).  The (surely deliberate) attempt to look hip and trendy by straying into WebCameron territory is pointless unless the great benefits of WebCameron are realised.  Most argue that Cameron’s site did not go quite far enough towards interaction, and, fundamentally, failed to keep moving forwards.  Instead, it has stagnated.  The new Number10 has a ready stream of content to keep it fresh, but it is simply press releases and speech transcripts.  I want to see short video clips of Gordon behind his desk telling us “I’ve just got off the phone with Putin, discussing South Ossetia.  We are agreed on…”.  Such content can be put up within minutes, and would give the public at least a nudge towards believing that Gordon is actually serving a purpose behind that shiny black door.

This is a typical government Emperor’s New Clothes phenomenon.  You know the story: the Emperor is really proud of his new outfit and shows it off to everyone.  Blinded by the Emperor’s presence and the fact that everyone is enamoured by the outfit, everyone is amazed by this most brilliant set of clothes ever produced.  Until one thoughtful person points out that the Emperor is, in fact, stark naked.  Here is a blog: it’s built on Wordpress, it looks like a blog, it feels like a blog, it quacks like a blog… etc. In fact, though, it is nothing of the sort.  It uses blogging software where a traditional CMS would be more appropriate.  It integrates photos via Flickr instead of directly though the site simply because Flickr sounds trendy.  Likewise video is pumped via YouTube on the front page, because of brand association, and then via a different out-of-the-box system on a the video page because YouTube isn’t actually the best way to show video after all.  As for the use of Twitter: a nonsense gesture, and transparently vacuous.  Everything that makes this website look like a blog is inefficient and wrong: in short, only there to make it look like a blog!

They don’t seem to get it.  The Number 10 website could easily have become a fantastic blog-based hub of accessible government.  It could have featured regular minute-long video pieces from the prime minister, with comment facilities below.  It could have hosted the ability to discuss the vast number of press releases and speeches archived on the site.  It should, at the very least, have hosted a blog from Gordon Brown.  He need not have pretended he had time to log into Wordpress and hit “publish” five times a day, but if he can squeeze out three books while Chancellor and Prime Minister, he can knock off a few blog posts each week.

I do not regularly comment on new government website builds, but this one was different.  It was built up in the press as the dawn of a new era in prime ministerial closeness.  Instead, it is a perfect exercise in appearing to be everything that you want, but actually turning out to be nothing at all.  I am severely disappointed in this squandered opportunity: the Emperor’s clothes may be new, but they are not actually clothes at all.

Warning: Long, probably unoriginal and intensely self-indulgent post focused on ideological rambling to follow. Ignore if you (perhaps justifiably) suffer a tendency to hurl accusations of pomposity at such posts; it’ll be better for us all.

The State and the Citizen: Or, Why I am a Democratic Socialist, part 1.

We move from first basics; we assume, in general, that people seek what they define as happiness, as Bentham suggests. It’s the only definition of human activity beyond the soul-destroying vagaries of genetic struggle which accommodates the more perverse elements of human behaviour. And it creates few problems; who would deny they want to be happy in life?

This should, for the most part, mean people are left to their own devices; happiness is subjective, and can only be achieved for each individual by those individuals. Anyone who pursues their own happiness and does not infringe upon the attempts of others to do the same only does what seems natural. They have every right to do so.

There are, however, conflicts likely to arise; some citizens will attempt to derive their pleasure at the expense of others. Say, if an individual chooses to steal from another the fruit of their labour; thereby furthering their pleasure at the expense of another. A state is thus necessary, with its primary purpose to balance the interests of citizens. It must seek to create the greatest happiness for the greatest number - in essence, a utilitarian tool.

Clearly, by virtue of universal humanity, we can assume certain freedoms are essential for that pursuit of happiness. The state must seek to safeguard those freedoms if it wishes to create the greatest happiness for the greatest number; and the classical libertarian definition of freedom won’t do, as it allows individuals and corporations to assault individual freedom. The state must, of course, have clear boundaries and be bound by the rule of law - but we must accept an interventionist state is necessary for greater freedom.

Instead of the libertarian definition of freedom, we should consider a doctrine of applied freedom; where theoretical liberty characterised by absence of legal restraint is useless if held back by real-life circumstances. Clearly, people aren’t free if they’re hungry; they cannot focus on the pursuit of happiness as they need to find food first. People aren’t free if a thief breaks down their door and ransacks their home. People aren’t free if they’re freezing - or suffer extreme poverty and have no escape, or lack support in their old age, or are orphaned, or ignorant, or their planet is dying through the negligence of others. They cannot act independently, and so cannot move towards happiness.

The state must guarantee these essential needs and freedoms if it’s to create the greatest happiness for the greatest number. Taxation becomes necessary; those who can afford it should be taxed at a level which won’t seriously impede their ability to seek happiness to allow those who can’t to seek that same happiness. The money raised funds the apparatus of freedom; state education to ensure all have the chance to pursue happiness, a police force to protect that chance and pensions to allow those who can’t work the same chance.

But even that’s not enough. The power of organised capital and corporations can be as damaging to individual freedom and happiness as any level of state power. Consider the relationship between an unskilled worker and a multinational corporation; there are many of the former, and despite the absolute necessity of many of the roles they fill, their sheer numbers ensure that employers can, in effect, screw them over. They need to work to survive, and so will work for virtually any wage - yet their employers don’t need them in particular, so can pay them any wage, no matter how low. The workers can’t refuse that piddling wage, as they’ll lose their jobs; and without those jobs, they’ll find themselves thrown on the mercies of society. In short, a clear example of certain individuals grossly profiting and the expense of others. So, the state must intervene, ensuring all employers pay a minimum wage on which it is possible to survive.

Likewise, if a group of selfish individuals control an essential and universal service, they can wreak havoc on the lives and livelihoods of others; witness the cruel absurdities of healthcare in the USA. Those who control an industry can take control, jack up the prices and so the profits - and if people can’t afford the service, they suffer. Universally necessary services in private hands are conducted to the benefit of those private hands - not the majority who desperately need them.

So, the state must take any essential services for which there is a universal human need, and ensure they’re universally accessible. You cannot be truly free if you’re sick; so a universally accessible national health services is necessary. You cannot be truly free if you’re freezing; so mass energy generation should be nationalised and energy - or the means of generating it at a household level - made accessible to all. This can take place on a partial basis too, if it’s all that’s needed. You can’t be free if you’re homeless but want a roof - so the state should build and control some housing. You can’t be free if you can’t reach your place of work as you don’t own private transport - so the state needs to provide some level of nationalised transport. And so on. The objective is to prevent one group of individuals gaining so much power over others as to make those others’ existence a misery; and the means of delivering this is placing the means by which life might be made into a misery into the hands of a neutral entity which exists for the benefit of all.

To ensure those services are rendered to the benefit of all, those who control the state must be rigorously accountable - and subject to regular elections. The power of the electorate to demolish any government that doesn’t act in the interests of the greatest number ensures that governments will act in the popular interest. Here, we see the superiority of nationalised essential services over the same services when they exist in private hands; democratic elections ensure those services are administered to the benefit of citizens, rather than the owners as they are when privatised.

The state thus exists to benefits citizens - and only to benefit citizens. Regular elections should ensure this; while a codified constitution setting out the fundamental rights of citizens and the barriers of government ensure the same in between elections. If, though, the state breaks that constitution, and so assaults the population’s basic liberty, then citizens have a right to legal redress; the state is as bound by the constitution as citizens are by the rule of law, and so must be answerable. If the state prevents that legal redress from occurring, it ceases entirely to act in the interests of citizens, and so becomes a Tyranny. If a state descends into Tyranny and sheds the essential manacles of democracy, then citizens in turn are no longer obliged to obey that state’s laws.  Why should they sacrifice their happiness and liberty if they receive neither security nor the happiness of others in return? They shouldn’t. They have a right to rebel, throwing off the chains of the state which betrayed them and reclaiming that happiness. This right to insurrection must be written in the constitution; for only then will potential tyrants remember their peril.

A strange situation at Pickled Politics tonight; take a look at the comments thread here. The poster raised the well documented absurdity of the policing at the Kingsnorth Climate Camp. And found himself leapt upon by commenters as a hysterical leftie thoroughly disconnected from reality.

The following comment is typical:

The state are not imposing anything on anyone here. Just because you are forcibly removed from an area does not make you any more right, nor does it automatically entitle you to call yourself a victim. Why don’t these people, go home, get ‘actually’ politically active and try to come up with solutions instead of trying to manufacture publicity through stunts?

Pardon? The state very much has imposed itself here. Citizens have a democratic right to protest; one supposedly guaranteed in law by the Human Rights Act. They may gather on any piece of public land to voice their concerns over any matter. The state should exist to protect those very freedoms. If the state - or its agents, the police - attempts to restrict them, it commits an assault on liberty and fails in its role.

The protestors at Climate Camp were clearly peaceful. They came there to hold workshops on environmental life and climate change, not viciously beat up policemen. Some didn’t attempt to hide their intention of shutting down the power-station, no; but that, at most justified a police cordon around the power station to protect what’s legally private property. (That it spews out noxious gas and thus directly affects those around it, very much bringing the matter into the public interest, remains to be addressed…). The protestors within the Climate Camp should have been free from harrassment.

So when the police spend an estimated £3 million to bus in officers from far-flung corners of the country to set-up a cordon around the camp before routinely entering it, ransacking private possessions and cart-off protestors on any pretext, they do impose themselves. The protestors have a right to make themselves heard, and when a force supposed to protect that right mercilessly shits on it, they are victims.

More bizarre were comments along these lines:

I showed an American friend this video, she laughed, she said they were so brutal, her shoe nearly fell off!

Come on. There actions are probably over the top. But brutal? Have you heard the quip about heaven, where the Police are British, the chefs are French etc?

In France, the CRS would have literally beat the shit out of them. In fact, I cannot think of another country where the all police wouldn’t have drawn their batons straight away.

Wait - so because our instances of authoritarian policing are less brutal than those abroad, they become okay? Police brutality against peaceful protestors remains police brutality; just because the French riot police are downright sadistic doesn’t stop an assault on democratic freedoms across the channel from being just that.

It isn’t hysteria to rage at length over this. Protest is an essential tool to remind the powerful you exist; the state, which exists to protect and extend the freedom of all citizens, cannot be allowed to choose when or how it’s acceptable to exercise that freedom. Unless the exercise of liberty infringes on that of another, it’s not its job, and shouldn’t be - unless we enjoy repression.

Excellent news; a group of MPs plan to launch a motion challenging the current Oath of Allegiance sworn by MPs before taking their seats. The current wording is transparently medieval:

“I swear by Almighty God that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, her heirs and successors, according to law. So help me God.”

Atheists may opt out of swearing by God - but what of republicans? They’re forced to swallow their principles and spout the oath if they wish to represent their constituents. Democratically elected representatives must swear to an unelected figure or, as with Sinn Fein, betray the constituents who elected them and refuse to take their seats.

The republican case for dropping the oath, along with the entire monarchy, is strong enough; any democratic system must ensure sovereignty is derived from the people and not an unelected figurehead. The oath suggests MPs have a greater duty to the monarch rather than their constituents - and so, surely, defeats the point of electing representatives rather than appointing them. It’s merely a symptom of a grossly unrepresentative cancer in our constitution, which needs removal.

But even the most ardent monarchist must see the arguments here. The one Tory who supports the motion, Peter Bottomley, makes the case well enough; the Parliament exists, in our outdated constitution, to advise the monarch as to the will of the people. As such, all representatives of the people must be allowed entry, even those who seek to abolish the monarchy, must be allowed entry to argue their case. He wants an opt-out rather than the fundamental change republicans ultimately must seek - but he agrees that the oath has to change.

So, congratulations to Norman Baker (who, incidentally, is in double favour at present) and the 21 other MPs launching the motion - both for the motion, and for pissing off Tebbit.