If Christmas is the time for goodwill, New Year is the time for optimism. Everywhere one looks is adorned with the popular slogan “Happy New Year” - even Tesco have been at it. The internet is saturated with friendly greetings of annual wishfulness, from the blogosphere to social networking sites. Call me grumpy, but I’ve had enough of it.

Please don’t misunderstand me: I wish everyone well for 2008 and I hope it will be a happy year. But I see myself as a realist, and as such I shall be cautious in expecting a “happy new year”, if only because I anticipate disappointment.

There are two sides to every coin, but allow me to counter the flagrant positivism of the collective today in compiling a list of reasons why 2008 probably won’t be so great after all.

1. The country began going down the pan the day Brown took office, and it’s only going to get worse. Sadly, he has his borrowed mandate until 2010, and has more or less ruled out an election until at least 2009. Thus 2008 will be the year of the floundering lame duck government.
2. The economy’s heading for recession.
3. The SNP will gain even more popularity, and the separation of the Union will be discussed more realistically.
4. With the government in free-fall, far-right groups are bound to grow in support.
5. The London Mayoral elections will offer the electorate (of which your’s truly recently became a member) a choice between the vile crypto-socialist creature we have become familiar with, a permanently dazed buffoon, and a liberal ex-liberal policeman. There’s no silver lining to that cloud.
6. Further afield, the violence in Iraq will doubtless escalate because Brown bottled handling the most important thing he inherited. Iran is bound to get more assertive. It’s all change in Russia. And, of course, we end 2007 with Pakistan making Iraq look like a safe-haven.
7. Things have quietened down a bit in Israel lately: it must be about time for one side to do something stupid, and to be met with retaliation, with the whole cycle of violence flaring up again.

I’m sure there are many more reasons not to get too optimistic about 2008. Your thoughts in the comments section are more than welcome.

Earlier today, Jan Berry, the chair of the Police Federation, attempted to bring the acrimonious pay dispute between the Home Office and the Police to a close. In an open letter to Jacqui Smith, says that she believes that the Home Secretary was ill advised and that the fracas was not her fault. She then goes on to say that it’s not too late, and urges against the situation, “escalating.”

This offer of an olive branch is, I suppose, admirable, and certainly more sensible than anything the government’s done so far. But I do hope that the Federation are sincere in their promise that they, “have no intention of letting this go.” I fear it would be very damaging if they do.

Let us ignore the exact fiscal connotations of the pay agreement for the moment, and just look at what’s happened so far. The pay-agreement was made during arbitration. The Home Office broke the agreement. Naturally, the police were angry, and equally naturally want their pay.

But let’s look at this another way now. The government broke its promise. If it’s willing to do that to its most loyal agents, how does that bode for the electorate? Badly, I fear. Certainly, it’s not going to do new Labour’s reputation for (dis)honesty any good. The Brown government has already got a poor reputation for being economical with its own words from the election, the EU Constitution and the like. This blatant breach of trust can only make that image worse.

And what about the message this decision sends out to employers? The government, which should be setting an example, is lying to its own workers. Doesn’t that only give carte blanche to any employer in business that does the same? Gordon thinks it’s okay, after all. Certainly, it now seems hypocritical for the government to criticise any employer in business for deceiving the workforce or the public. Which is a shame, especially given that this is meant to be a Labour government.

So I hope that Smith caves in on this, for everyone’s sake. I don’t think she will, as Brown’s government has a fanatical commitment to not raising inflation, ever - despite the fact that upheaval seems distinctly more likely with a militant police force than the negligible increase in inflation meeting this agreement would cause. But, we’ll see.

I had seen adverts for St Trinian’s on the Underground before Christmas, and was slightly confused about who the target audience was.  By all accounts, St Trinian’sis a “tweenage” girl’s dream: it features a large cast of girls that any impressionable young lady might aspire to.  Yet the publicity was clearly aimed at pervy men (girls in school uniform with too much make-up and suspenders…).  Perhaps the hope was that dodgy men would take their daughters to see the film.

It wasn’t far into the film before I began to see that my suspicions were not unfounded.  There was a decidedly adult feel about the movie, which called into question the 12A rating.  Part of the group I watched the film with was an 11-year-old girl: I am sure that many of the jokes went over her head.

The storyline was far-fetched, but you can’t expect much else from a rather camp film about tearaway teenagers.  St Trinian’s school is a dumping ground for “ungovernable” girls, under the very liberal (almost anarchic) Camilla Fritton, ably played by Rupert Everett in drag.  As with any school, the girls are immediately typecast into social groups (The Posh Totty group, The Geeks, The Emos, etc).  This is not a film for realistic social commentary, but comedy was often extracted from the social groupings in fairly intelligent ways.

The chief figure of authority in the school is the Head Girl Kelly, played by Gemma Arterton.  She appears to mastermind a complex system of moneymaking, with the girls mass-producing a brand of potent vodka and then trying to flog it to dense wheeler-dealer Flash Harry (the perfectly-cast Russel Brand).  The girls are trying to diversify their industry, introducing Flash to their latest product (tampons) with comic effect.

The main plot-line follows the school’s financial uncertainty.  The school is served a notice of bankruptcy, and the girls take it upon themselves to make £500,000 to sake the school by stealing a painting from the National Gallery.  In a plot-line clearly devised just to get Stephen Fry starring, the girls have to get to the finals of “Schools Challenge”, a quiz-show somewhere between University Challenge and QI.

The sub-plot was far more interesting for someone of a few years older and of the opposite gender to the target audience.  Newly-appointed Minister for Education wishes to reform the education system, starting with the very worst school: St Trinian’s.  Colin Firth brings his typical je ne sais quoi to the film, along with as many Pride and Prejudice gags as you can get your hands on.  Ms Fritton’s dog (naturally called Mr Darcy) likes to hump the minister’s leg, leading to an entertaining gift for the attending press pack.  In another scene, he is caught with his trousers down in front of the “Posh Totty” clique; cue a slapstick sequence of being thrown from a window into a swimming pool, then a trademark “Wet Shirt” scene.  It is a testament to the BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice (and, indeed, to Firth’s performance in it) that the chief male protagonist has been unable to see the back of it.

So, there was something in St Trinian’s for everyone.  There was a silly plot-line involving save-the-day schoolkids for the girls to enjoy, enough adult jokes to entertain the middle-aged, and more female flesh than should be allowed (including a daring scene including a shower, stolen clothes and a number of “hidden” cameras).

If you want an Oscar-winning piece of art, don’t see St Trinian’s.  But if you want a bit of camp fun with a plot more holey than Mother Theresa, a Gatling gun joke rate, and a wide spectrum of entertainment, then it’s well worth a fiver.  It’s a very well-made film, and very entertaining.  It’s no masterpiece, but it doesn’t pretend to be.

Funniest Moment: Tony Blair appointed Peace Envoy to the Middle East.
Saddest Moment: The knives go in for Ming Campbell.

Best Political Decision: Miliband’s spineless refusal to run for Labour leadership.
Worst Political Decision: The phantom election.

The Stephen Fry Award for Unbounded Eloquence: Michelle Obama.
The Prescott Award for Gobbledegook: David Davis.

Best Photograph: Ming Campbell and the toilet.
Worst Photograph: Ming Campbell and the toilet.

Best Video: Serj Tankian – Empty Walls.
Worst Video: Can America trust the BBC?

Best Newcomer: Emily Benn.
The George McGovern Memorial Award for Political Flops: Respect Renewal.

Best Album: Nine Inch Nails – Year Zero.
Worst Album: The Spice Girls Reform (Not an album, but the musical disaster of 2007 nonetheless).

The Hunter S Thompson Award for Journalism: Ben Goldacre.
The Daily Mail Award for Tedious Media Populism: The Times editorial team.

The Robin Cook Award for Most Principled Action: None this year.
The John Redwood Award for Political Spinelessness: The CPS for not pressing charges on Cash for Honours.

Event of the Year: Tony Blair’s resignation.
Catastrophe of the Year: The phantom election.

Scribo Ergo Sum Person of the Year: Gary Kasparov (Screw you, Time).

(Salmond’s New Year Message)

Lots of text again, I know. Hopefully they’ll get better soon. But while I’m working out a way to cut down the text while only being able to use photos as I can’t draw, it may be a slow process.

I very rarely express unreserved appreciation for any one particular book.  Andreï Makine’s Confessions of a Lapsed Standard Bearer, is an exception. A slim novel that’s almost easy to miss on the shelf, Makine’s book has two principle virtues.  It is a touching, poignant tale written with sensitivity which fully engages the reader.  It also offers a fascinating perspective on Soviet life rarely found in the Western mainstream at least. Written as the reminiscence of a Soviet defector to a childhood friend, the novel traces the youth of two children growing up in the USSR.  Moving from their days in the Young Pioneers, to their family lives, to their gradual disillusionment.

Throughout the novel, Makine maintains a sensitive tone not unlike that of a man gazing at the past through rose-tinted glasses.  It’s not that bad things don’t happen – it’s that they do, and that the narrator wishes for a return to the simplicities of childhood.  The result is a touching tale whose narrative sticks in the mind pleasantly.

What makes the novel most interesting, though, is the not entirely incidental depiction of everyday Soviet life it gives.  Makine is a Russian, born in the 1950s, who defected to France in the 1980s.  The insight he can thus provide into growing up in the USSR is as valuable as it is interesting. Previously, my closest knowledge of everyday life in Soviet Russia came from Solzhenitsyn – who hardly provides a typical example.  Millions were interned in the gulags of One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich.  But millions of others simply lived the ordinary lives of ordinary civilians.  It is this perspective that Makine provides for us in Confessions of a Lapsed Standard Bearer.

What’s immediately apparent is that, by Western standards, conditions were grim.  The characters live in dull, communal housing.  Food is rationed.  The days are very clearly monotonous – they get up, they go and do hard, physical labour, they come home.  Even seemingly trivial changes mean huge news for the local community.  When a local landmark, “The Pit,” is filled in, it’s one of the biggest things to have happened in years.  In short, they virtually live in poverty.

What’s even more striking though is that no-one seems to mind.  It might be that they’re well provided for in some senses.  They all get an education, albeit a heavily controlled one.  They all get fed, albeit basically.  They’re all guaranteed a job and a roof over their heads. But even then, it’s all a very basic standard of life.  Perhaps it’s because they’ve never known anything better?  The characters’ will certainly never have known a better life.  Perhaps they have other things on their minds – ideals, even?  The narrator was very enamoured of the Red Flag, always marching onto the horizon, as a boy.  In the Soviet newspapers, only positive news for communism appears – so events like the Cuban Revolution lead to the families thinking the global victory is imminent.  Perhaps it’s nothing to do with the conditions at all?  The narrator’s positive reminiscences may simply be for the simple days of youth.

Of course, the book isn’t perfect.  If nothing else, it probably loses something in translation – Makine is a Russian who writes in French and is translated into English.  Nor is the novel a, “classic,” of literature – but it doesn’t try to be.  What it does try – and succeed – in being is a sweet, poignant memoir of a forever lost childhood, with the added bonus of seeing Soviet life from the ground up for once.

An Inauspicious Start

I see little point explaining the set-up of the protest here.  It’s already been done several times on this website, so I’d only be wasting keystrokes.  Instead, I’ll move straight into the narrative.

The protest began inauspiciously enough.  All of us arrived a little late – all perfectly unavoidable, but late nonetheless.  This didn’t really matter, though.  We didn’t have a howling mob of intransigent libertarians waiting for us, so no-one was kept waiting.  Indeed, it would be rather hard for all of three protestors (yes, three!  Aren’t we good at drumming up support…) to hold each other up.  But still, an inauspicious start.

This floundering beginning was, ultimately, followed up by a long-drawn out flop of a protest.  It’s hardly surprising – it’s very difficult to draw much attention to yourself with only three protestors.  But the first problem we hit had nothing to do with that.  It was even worse than that.

We couldn’t work out where to protest.  We had ourselves, we had our nice, ironic leaflets, and we had our permission to protest.  We were ready to go out there and defend our rights through ridicule.  But we didn’t know where precisely we were allowed to ridicule.  On Friday night, Ali received a rather confusing missive from the Met informing him that they were placing, “no restrictions,” on the protest – before going on to say that he was allowed to protest on the, “East Side of Parliament Square and Millbank.”

So, we weren’t restricted – but we weren’t allowed out of the East Side of the Square, or of Millbank.  There is a gap of several hundred yards between the East of Parliament Square and Millbank.  This gap includes the centre of Parliament Square, Parliament itself and Westminster Abbey.  In short, it contains all of the bits where there are people.

I’m sorry, was that something about no restrictions?  Either they were trying to stall the protest by restricting it, or simply by confusing us.  Whichever it was, they hadn’t been very helpful so far – getting back to us the day before the protest, sending a bewildering letter, and generally restricting us.  But then again, I suppose that’s superficially what we were protesting about.  It’s what Ali wrote on the permission form.  Maybe they took us at face value, without the benefit of a glaringly sarcastic leaflet to guide them…

After a few moments heated debate – that is, amiable and confused dithering – the, “Crush Freedom,” protest group decided to strike out for Millbank.  So, across Parliament Square.  We had leaflets in our hands.  I do hope that doesn’t count as protest in the eyes of the police.  We wouldn’t want to break the law now, would we?

Of course, it turned out that Millbank was, by and large, completely empty.  On the way there, we passed the Home Office.  On an impulse, I dashed across the deserted road.  Wouldn’t it have been amusing to post a leaflet to Jacqui herself?  Oh, yes, hilarious.  Assuming, of course, that it wasn’t burned before reaching her for fear of being shot through with anthrax…

Unfortunately, the swine who designed the building failed to include a letter-box.  This ghastly oversight, compounded by the presence of sliding glass doors, made getting the leaflet to the erstwhile Chief Whip turned National Whip nigh-on-impossible.  For a moment, I considered nailing it to the flag-mast outside the building, a sort of latter-day Martin Luther for civil-liberties.  Minus the homophobia, religious fanaticism and the funny hat…

Of course, this scheme was also shelved when I realised none of us were in the habit of carrying a hammer and nails.  It’s probably just as well.  There’s always the risk that they’d take the flyer seriously and be inspired to crush yet more freedoms – or just arrest us as the sort of nutters who’re willing to post insolent notes to the Home Secretary.

A few buildings later, we found DEFRA.  They don’t have a letter-box either – these architects really ought to consider pretentious farts hoping to confuse the government when they design buildings – but they did have a set of railings.  In went a leaflet.  Of course, DEFRA have nothing to do with this protest, and Hilary Benn is immensely unlikely to get the flyer – but if he does…

Actually, if he does, I’m rather glad it’s the Fifth Way mentioned and not here.

Leaflets, Ladies and Laughter

But enough of this.  Millbank wasn’t really worth looking at – there were even less people than the thoroughly underpopulated East Side of Westminster Square.  Certainly, we didn’t shift any of the leaflets there – not to people, anyway.  We therefore moved onto Parliament Square itself, ending up a few yards away from the visitor’s entrance to the Houses of Parliament.

Of course, this was (I think?  That letter was so vague and so specific at the same time that I still don’t know) strictly illegal.  If we were taking those locational instructions seriously, then we were somewhere outside the permitted protest zone.  But, given that the protest was ostensibly for the protest ban zone, in order to demonstrate the beauty of free speech and the stupid superfluity of the law, breaking the restrictions placed on us added to the irony no end.  So we did it.

Well, that, and the fact that a policeman walked right in front of us while we were leafleting rather confirmed that they couldn’t care less about us.

The leafleting itself was largely uneventful.  As I’ve learned in the past waving buckets for charity, the general public has a lofty disdain for people on the street trying to attract their attention.  Actually, I’d know that even if I hadn’t leafleted or collected money.  I’m a member of the general public, I ignore them too.  Perhaps a tad hypocritical given that I know how frustrating it is for the waver – but there we go.  Would you do any differently?

The highlight of the actual protest was without a doubt when someone took the leaflets at face value.  A corpulent woman with an indistinguishable accent approached us, looking puzzled.  “What are you handing out leaflets for?” came the question, slightly strained in tone.  We handed her a leaflet.

They don’t take long to read.  It didn’t take long for her to look up, looking utterly puzzled…

“You’re protesting to…”

There was a bemused pause.  We hadn’t been ready for anyone to confront us.  What on earth were we going to say?  That we weren’t serious?  Explain it immediately?  Play it straight?

“We’re protesting against the right to protest,” filled in the ever-helpful R.E Vamp, stammering a little.  The woman’s wobbly draw dropped a little further.

“Why?”

Ah.  That one’s always the killer, isn’t it?  Irrational right-wing authoritarians who hold meetings like this in good faith can never answer it.  The lack of rationality tends to do that.

“They’re…uh…” R.E Vamp floundered, jaw flapping a little.  Poor him.  I should probably have chipped into help with an ad-lib fascistic rant about protecting the leaders, but I was having too hard a time keeping a straight face for that.  I’d have floundered like him because of that, no doubt.  So no need to make a fool of myself as well, when there was this fine entertainment laid out before me.  Was that too cruel?

“They’re…subversive.  Yes, subversive.”

I can’t recall if the woman actually said anything at this point, or whether she was just too confused to quite frame the words.  There was a hugely awkward pause for a moment.  The woman was completely aghast.  She really seemed to think we wanted to stop people protesting in Parliament Square.  Vamp coughed tentatively.

“We’re…not actually serious.”

The woman laughed nervously, as if a trio of madmen were gazing at her.  (Were they?  You decide, dear reader…)

“I rather hoped not…but…”

We explained the point of the protest, each trying to hold back the laughter I suspect.  The woman, meanwhile, laughed nervously again, scurrying away shortly after.  Out came the laughter…

In retrospect, I worry that more people might take the leaflets at face value.  The irony is pretty blatant to someone who knows about SOCPA, but given that about half of the leaflets we handed out were to tourists, not all of them might get it.  No doubt, there’s now a deeply confused family somewhere in downtown Tokyo that is convinced the UK is full of strange, quasi-fascistic youths out there to, “Crush Freedom.” (We shouted that after a few people we handed leaflet to).  Ah well.  Such is the price one pays for protesting outside parliament, no doubt.

Douglas makes a mistake

Our official protest finished at 12, so we went for a spot of light lunch and a (ruinously expensive) hot chocolate from the Café Nero by Westminster Tube.  As an aftermath, Ali and R.E Vamp decided that we should hand a leaflet to Brian Haw.  I followed at first, a little unwillingly.  I’m somewhat less in awe of the man than Vamp, and wasn’t sure I really felt the need to actually speak to him.  Of course, I deeply respect the conviction and courage he’s displayed in actually sitting out there for six and a half years – and I wholeheartedly support him against the government in his attempts to exercise the fundamental right to open his mouth.

I can’t help feeling, though, that when he opens his mouth, he doesn’t express an entirely rational view.  He’s always struck me as one of those on the anti-war left who’s so opposed to any conflict that he’ll ignore so many faults on the part of Saddam Hussein and the Taliban as to deny their sheer evil.  Fine, he wants to oppose the war.  I do too, because as I said in my article yesterday, I don’t think it works.

But what I don’t understand is how someone who opposes oppression, or murder, or tyranny, can ignore a brutally tyrannical regime like Ba’athist Iraq.  The Taliban and Ba’ath dictatorships were undeniably vile.  And yet there very rarely seems to be a word in the anti-war movement written against them.  It’s almost as if they hadn’t existed, so eager is the intransigent element of the pacifist movement to condemn the war.  In the Christmas Special of New Statesman, Haw wrote an article declaring solidarity with protestors against Mugabe in Zimbabwe.  How can he oppose Mugabe and yet ignore Hussein?

Of course, I’ve no idea if he ignores Saddam or not.  I’ve never heard him say a word against his dictatorship while he’s calling the Labour government one.  But for all I know, he could hate Hussein more than I could possibly imagine.

That’s not the point though.  I’m not trying to describe my considered reflections, but my feelings and fears at the time.  My fear was that he was sort of narrow-minded zealot who was so set in his view that war was evil that he hadn’t realised military dictatorship was too.

This seemed all but confirmed by a poster that caught my eye on the edge of the squat.  “STOP GENOCIDE IN IRAQ!!!” it said. (The triple punctuation may have done something to increase my ire.  If you can’t make a sentence emphatic without resorting to shallow punctuation mistakes, then rephrase it.  If you can’t rephrase it, then don’t say it as you’ll look so silly as to completely undermine yourself.)

The poster then went on to lambaste the government for committing genocide on the Iraqi people.  It conspicuously ignored the fact that Saddam did commit genocide – the Kurds didn’t even get a mention.  To my mind at the time, this seemed like rank hypocrisy.  I was almost disgusted by it.  So I couldn’t bring myself to go and speak to him after all.

On reflection, that was perhaps the most stupid mistake of the day.  I might have been completely unfounded in my assessment.  I should have gone and confronted him with it, and found out his attitude.  It might have been the most interesting thing to happen to me for a while.  But, of course, we all do stupid things occasionally – and that was my idiocy for the week there.  More fool me.

Reflections

On the whole, it’s best to treat yesterday as a learning process, I think.  Frankly, the protest was a bit of a flop.  There were only three of us.  We drew absolutely no attention to ourselves.  We only shifted about 100 leaflets.  We probably confused half of the people we gave them to.  We couldn’t even work out where we were meant to be.  All in all, we were virtually useless.

But it’s a start!  Without that flop, we’d have no idea what to do next time.  And I think we were able to draw some lessons out of it all, at least.  So, for anyone who wants to organise a protest and has as little idea as we did yesterday, a few tips:

• Organise.  This, I suspect, was our biggest failing.  It’s probably the reason we only had three people turn up – because we weren’t definite enough about dates, times and places until the very last minute, no-body thought it was worth turning up.  Picking Christmas was probably a bad idea too – far too many people are away for it to work.
• Get noticed.  We did this very poorly.  We didn’t make any noise.  We didn’t make people notice us.  We didn’t even have a banner.  People probably weren’t even aware that we were protestors.  Definitely needs attention in the future.
• Don’t be too nervous of the police: They should warn you before arresting you, it seems, as long as you’re not waving a gun about.  Even if they don’t, principle probably dictates that this shouldn’t be an issue.  Certainly, we couldn’t have afforded to be braver, I suspect.

So, a flop, but a fun one.

The Set-Up

The arrangement was fairly simple, or so I though: from 10AM to 12PM as many as we could attract would protest against the right to protest while having official permission to protest and saying that we should, at very least, keep this demand in place.

In the event it turned out that the Scribo Ergo Sum authors were the only ones there, myself included, and I turned up almost half an hour late as a consequence of getting to sleep at around quarter past six that morning but, this considered, I was in a surprisingly suitable state for the protest. It was cold but this only left things brisk.

Douglas I had already met in person, through a mutual friend, but meeting Ali was an introduction, at least in person. It was not the most extreme example possible but it remains strange to me that you can “Meet” somebody upon and via the internet yet never have seen them and never have heard their voice. This is an instance of futureshock, I imagine.

“Shall we protest, then?” I was asked. I replied in the affirmative and we got to work.

Baby Steps

The actual arrangement of the protest was rather tricky: the terms set by the approval were both meticulously precise and bafflingly vague. We ended up wandering around Westminster and leaving a leaflet through DEFRAs mailbox. Unfortunately the Home Office seemed to have no equivalent, presumably due to some cowardly fear of explosives being inserted into it. Whaever happened to real men?

Oh, right, Jacqui Smith is…Uh, moving on.

Eventually we found a crowded location which seemed to be beyond the boundary but devoid of many police, thus suitable. Unfortunately we later realised that it was immediately outside the guest entrance to the House of Commons and thus a police officer but thankfully this particular one seemed fully occupied with their role and thus left us unmolested.

We got through a surprising amount of the leaflets, in the event, albeit primarily to tourists. Which means we might well have convinced Japan but the number of English people we got them to is unclear.

How well the irony of the leaflets {which hopefully somebody more technologically literate can post a picture of} translated is also something which I am uncertain of but the people walking away seemed to be reading the literature we gave them so I am pleased enough.

That said it was very cold and many people ignored us entirely but that comes with the territory for winter and leafleteering in general, respectively. A policeman walked by on a few occasions but I managed to resist the urge to give him one.

The finest moment came when a maternal looking woman from an unknown foreign location stopped opposite from us and asked us what we were protesting about. I informed her that we were protesting against the right to protest and she seemed rather bemused, pausing for a short while to consider this before asking the obvious: ‘Why?’ This I found surprisingly hard to handle and eventually opted for: “They’re subversive”, doing my very best to keep a straight face and only barely managing it.

I also mentioned that they damage our society and handed her a leaflet.

This was read with a slightly concerned, slightly uncomprehending fashion and eventually she looked up and I told her that we were not exactly being entirely serious and she replied she had hoped as much.

After this exchange we did our best to rid ourselves of the rest of the leaflets before the time limit expired but did not stoop so low as to giving them out to the massive cluster of Americans congregating across the road from us. After this we went off for coffee and foods and then a meeting with a rather more tenacious, high-profile demonstator…

An Audience With Haw

We had seen the tents and posters, for they are hard to miss, in passing and decided to pay the arch-dissenter himself. Upon the approach a fit of nerves overtook us all and our noble editor hung back while Ali and I advanced.

Having seen him in various photographs, film footage and cartoons seeing him it was rather odd to view him up close and in the flesh. He was a good deal more weathered than the photographs of him taken a few years ago, as you would expect but I rather hadn’t.

I had rather anticipated it being a case of him holding court, the leftists of London congregating around him in rings and offering him their reverence and respect in return for his blessings and wisdom, an impression hardly dispelled by the sight of a middle aged woman cavorting around the area in a top hat. Upon arrival, however, it became clear that it was more a case of him and a few trusted allies {one of which gave him a supermarket sandwich} with everyone else regarded warily, as a gawper or potential threat. Asceticism reigned here and the ideal, not the man, was king.

My first question was how long he had been there {as it was a question which we had discussed amongst ourselves earlier} and he expressed disdain towards it, scoffing and tutting and wondering why I could not have asked a more original one {it later turned out that he had actually been there since June 2001, originally over sanctions} but things improved rapidly when I asked Ali to hand him the leaflet.

He is clearly a man not devoid of humour, despite his hard-boiled demeanor, and when we were approaching he was discussing his idea for a t-shirt poking fun at Gordon Brown {which the Fifth Way may well create and post upon Scribo Ergo Sum shortly} and he seemed to see the amusing side of the leaflet, although Ali took pains to make it perfectly clear that his intention was satirical, an act of great wisdom.

He seemed scornful, however, of our use of the word “Permission” when we described our difficulties arranging the event, arguing that since the authorities could not technically deny any request it was really “Approval” instead, and that under the Human Rights Act the Freedom of Expression was explicitly protected.

Taking legal advice from him might not be the best of ideas but he certainly had a well reasoned approached to the legal system. According to him such legislation was not for peaceful people but outlaws, a group which he implicitly distanced himself from. Considering his unshaven visage and his interaction with the police I found it hard to imagine a more suitable Platonic Ideal for an outlaw, but was polite enough to keep this observation to myself…

He was clearly, though, a man of principle and the embodiment of commitment to the cause. Despite having seven children and a wife he decided to spend his time waiting outside an institution that feels nothing but disdain and contempt for him to make a series of decisions that he is aware will never come.

Behind him was a rather revolting picture, barely distinguishable as human and in fact resembling some sad accident involving an omelette and tomato ketchup rather than anything even animal. I knew from a YouTube video that it was, in fact, a severely mutated child that most likely died shortly after the picture was taken. He claimed that this was a consequence of the use of spent uranium shelling in Afghanistan and that seems to be a likely allegation: the use of such ammunition results in a fine, radioactive dust that coats the surrounding area.

I once talked to a former soldier who had been exposed to it before seeing his health rapidly disintegrate, tests showing his blood to be heavily irradiated and his body suffering heavily from the exposure to these substances in almost every way possible. Worse still this form of weaponry is used in civilian areas and the settlement’s inhabitants are then not informed of the condition that their home has been left in. Given how much damage was done to an adult in peak, military appropriate physical condition I would hate to consider the effect of it upon a child within the womb.

I did not have to imagine it, though, it was in my face.

Although far harder to make into an amusing leaflet for any but the blackest of wits this seems as good a cause as any to include for our next protest.

I asked him the rather more pertinent question of when he was leaving, to conclude, his reply being that “I will leave when I’m told.” We looked rather surprised, at this, both presuming that this had already happened at least once. “But not by them.” Divine orders, I enquired? He stated that he would leave “When it ends, but it hasn’t even started.” he seemed slightly disdainful at the small numbers of people sleeping there, saying he wanted more and that “People need to wake up”.

He said that we were doing our part, though, although I have to say that I consider an hour and a half or so of aimless wandering and light leafleteering rather less strenuous than living on pavement for over six years.

Meeting Haw was an intense event, that alternated between incredibly awkward {for us, at least} and highly lucid. He mentioned his website so it only seems fair to link it here and hope that he checks his trackbacks on the hacked House of Commons wi-fi he presumably uses to update it:

http://www.parliament-square.org.uk/

Aftermath, wind-down

Afterwards we chatted politics on the green, then Ali left and gave me some bread since apparently they would not allow him to carry it into where he was headed. Thankfully the two loaves had cost him all of 30p.

In hindsight we should perhaps of been a good deal less cautious: a true activist sees the entire affair of protest as an inconvenience that they must endure to convince others and considers arrest to simply be yet another manifestation of the bother. Unfortunately a trio of polite middle class white boys are often not quite capable of emulating this attitude and this proved the case today. We distributed plenty but not all we had, and hardly caused a stir.

The amount of good we did was dubious but without having attempted anything we would have stood no chance at all. For an effort executed at short notice, on strictly limited funds and with the government not letting us know that it was even permitted {or authorised, as Haw would have it} until the night before the event it was certainly not a catastrophe and regardless of achievements was certainly an enjoyable day, well spent and certainly something that I intend to repeat.

(Gordon Brown releases New Year’s message: At an average 25 words per sentence, 2008 promises to be slightly less easy to read than Das Kapital)

Recently, my mind has (tragically) been occupied with the neocons. More specifically, I mean their foreign policy, and its relationship to the pro-Iraq War section of the British left.

There is a section of the British left in favour of an interventionist foreign policy. Given the outpour of overwhelming anger at this group from the outraged anti-war left (“How dare anyone disagree with us!”), it’d be hard to blame anyone for not knowing it. But they’re the people behind the Euston Manifesto, who wanted Kosovo, Sierra Leone and Iraq, and who supported Blair abroad in Labour.

What do they want? In their own words a, “reconfiguration of progressive opinion,” to what they perceive of as a more moral stance, especially in foreign policy. They’re pro-democracy, pro-human rights and pro-freedom. And they want to see this everywhere. Perhaps the Eustonians most distinctive commitment is a total opposition to tyranny across the globe – the cause of their international interventionism.

Essentially, the origins of the Eustononians were almost in the bad behaviour of the anti-war left. Disgusted at the stark apologism of RESPECT and other parts of the anti-war movement, they felt the need to take a stand and mark out the principles they felt the left has lost. It’s often hard to blame them. The behaviour of the anti-war movement has all too often been questionable. I find it hard to be comfortable with the elements in it that are quite happy to declare the UK a police state while denying that Saddam Hussein was actually a dictator. Jan Sloboda, I’m happy with; George Galloway, not at all.

So I can sympathise with the Eustonians, up to a point. They clearly want to do some good. Moreover, they’re certainly preferable to much the liberal-left these days, with its Michael Moore-esque fixation on eternal whinging. Often, the strongest argument of the pro-war left is that it’s all very well to moan about sanctions or a war to topple a tyrant as immoral, but what else is there to do? You’ve got the choice of denying that a dictator is a dictator (which is wrong), or doing nothing and practically supporting the dictator (which is also wrong). Take your pick.

No, I wouldn’t want to either.

When I disagree with the Euston Group, it’s usually over practise, not principle. In simple terms, I don’t believe it’s possible to import democracy on the barrel of a gun. War unquestionably brings out the worst in humanity. The senseless slaughter of man against man reveals a bestial, irrational side perfectly at home with narrow tribalism. How couldn’t it? When two groups of men are trying to rip bloody chunks out of each other, the, “us and them,” mentality must solidify pretty fast. Add to this the differences of language, culture and, most visibly, skin, that are present in situations like Iraq, and there’s even more material for opposition to work with. It’s not hard to see how a determined militant could turn a man against someone who, rationally, is their best friend.

Robespierre may not have known much (of use, at least; I’m sure he was very bright), but he was spot on when he said, “No one loves armed missionaries; the first lesson of nature and prudence is to repulse them as enemies.” (Ironic, given that that’s what he tried to do to the French…) No-one loves armed missionaries. You cannot force someone to be free. It must come from within – the people must want it. Support that revolution if you will. Seek it. But it must be perceived as from the people, not from abroad. Otherwise, it will fail – as has done from 1792, right through until 2002.

But, I can sympathise with that the Euston Group want, at least. They want democracy. They want freedom. They want to help people. How can I oppose that and keep a conscience?

Now let’s have a look at the neocons. They say they want freedom and democracy too. Do they? No. They act in America’s interests – which they feel are served best by their conception of freedom (that is; laissez faire capitalism), their conception of democracy (sometimes) and their international stability (always).

“But look at our commitment to freedom around the globe!” They cry. “We love freedom and hate tyranny. We saved Iraq! We oppose North Korea! We stop Rogue States from having the Bomb, and you wouldn’t want them having that, would you? Think of the children! We’re the true democrats, buddy.”

And, of course, superficially they’re right. They have, theoretically, been some of the strongest supporters of democracy around the globe in the last few decades.

That’s theoretically, though. Look a little closer, and you’ll realise that the neocons haven’t pursued a moral foreign policy since the days of the democratic revolutionaries in the early eighties. Even before Reagan was out, the old realpolitik of Kissinger that neoconservatism began as a reaction to was back in – Nicaraguan nukes, anyone?

So how can we go about exploding the myth that neoconservatism is freedom’s best friend? We’ll start with the wars they have fought. Iraq will do. The Americans had three priorities when the dust first settled; stability, their conception of democracy (everyone has a vote, and screw the civil freedoms to make it work) and the speedy introduction of a free market. Why? Because it suited America. The stability because less troops would be killed, and because it’s necessary for capitalism to function properly. The democracy because they believe that it works for stability, because it works well with the free-market, and maybe because they actually believe in it.

And the free-market? The money, my friend, the money.

Of course, the neoliberal officials sent to sort out the country thought the best way to do so would be to cut back the government as far as possible. This process, known as de-Ba’athisation, went a very long way. As well as very legitimately cutting out the totalitarian regime and the Ba’ath party almost totally, it virtually removed the government from every aspect of life in Iraq, theoretically at least. This was to free the market. This, happening in the midst of a war which rather made stability impossible, didn’t work hugely well. We’re – or rather, the Iraqis – are living with the consequences today.

What does this tell us, though? Ultimately, that the greatest concern of the neocons when they went into Iraq was the free market. I won’t judge whether that this was through greed, or a doctrinaire commitment to neoliberal economics, or the fact that they genuinely thought it would be best for everyone. A stable free-market on good terms with America – which, if the war had worked, Iraq might have been – would work in their interests. That it didn’t was perhaps their fault, perhaps not – but they certainly didn’t help by pursuing what they perceived to be those interests.

Now, let’s look at the wars that the neocons haven’t fought, and the fusses they haven’t made. Pakistan. Musharraf isn’t democratic in the slightest, and yet they support him. He keeps the terrorists down, they say. He supports them in Afghanistan, they say. He maintains stability, they say. But now the country is a powder-keg ready to explode, with the distinct possibility of the Islamists rather than the democrats taking over. Musharraf has recently been actively crushing democratic movements. One of the leading Pakistani democratic leaders has been murdered, and he wasn’t able to stop it. The country is manifestly not stable.

And yet the neocons aren’t calling for him to go.

Russia. Their economy collapsed after the neoliberal disaster of the nineties, and from the ashes rose Putin’s stern, unbending and very possibly undemocratic nationalism. Virtually every independent observer said the recent elections were not fair or free. He is holding onto power after he goes as president. It’s sliding towards the possibility of dictatorship.

And yet, the neocons aren’t calling for him to go. There is some rhetorical opposition, yes – but on neo-Star Wars, not the brutal silencing of opposition.

So why don’t the neocons get their act together and start complaining here? What makes these attacks on democracy so different to Iraq and Iran? What makes them swallow their apparent principles here?

The answers to these questions could be long and complicated. But one thing is notably true in both cases, and many similar cases. Pakistan and Russia both have open free markets to which the US economy, to one extent or another, has access. So does the massively repressive China, to a limited degree – along with many other authoritarian, anti-democratic regimes the neocons tolerate. There’s a strong government to maintain stability so that a free-market can function. Foreign companies – the American market – can invest. This means profit for America, it means strength – it’s in the national interest. Capitalism prevails.

But, what about Iran, North Korea, and pre-invasion Iraq? Would they let American goods on the market? Of course not. More than that, their leaders are often hostile to foreign involvement, and provide a theoretical threat to the USA, relative sizes notwithstanding and ignored. In their current states, they don’t represent anything in America’s interest – and might even harm it.

That’s ultimately the difference between the neocons and the pro-war left, on the foreign policy front. The neocons now want to serve America’s interests – which they best feel are guaranteed by a global free market. If democratic guarantees that, then they’ll support it – and if a brutal dictatorship guarantees the stability required, they’ll support that too. They want their type of freedom – economic freedom. The Euston Group types, on the other hand, are genuinely interested in freedom, democracy and human rights – real freedom.

That’s what the neocons wanted thirty years ago, when they were the democratic revolutionaries. That’s where the Eustonians should stay – on the principled, truly democratic side. And to stay there, they mustn’t engage in the sort of realpolitik that got the neocons where they are now by allying with the neocons. They’ve as much business doing that as the anti-war left has grouping with Islamic fundamentalists – none whatsoever. The enemy of their enemy is not their friend.