Time for some “militant secularism”; another shredding of faith schools, I feel. Observe the latest obscurantist wail from their defenders:

Selective, divisive, a law unto themselves: faith schools have been depicted by Ed Balls, secretary of state for schools, families and children, as a danger to Britain’s 9.8 million school-age children. Balls made his allegations last March, and has commissioned Sir Philip Hunter, the chief schools adjudicator, to investigate the 7000 faith schools in England and Wales. Hunter’s report is scheduled to reach ministers in September – and will, once again, stir up the row over faith schools.

Ball’s charges against faith schools can be dismissed one by one.

Really? They seem justified to me. Faith schools ground pupils in a seperate religious community, and so are divisive; they virtually require pupils to hold that faith, and so are selective; and raise hell (hah…) whenever the state which funds them imposes the same controls as it does on other schools it funds. Selective, divisive and a law unto themselves? Just a bit.

But, let’s hear what Ms. Odone has to say:

The schools do not select middle-class pupils or reject troubled ones. The intake of Christian schools reflects a broader ethnic range than comprehensive schools in the same area.

Class and race are synonymous? Look, we all enjoy a decent non-sequitur now and then, but to cite one phenomena and cite evidence (strangely without validated statistics) from another defeats itself. Balls’ point isn’t even addressed, save with unsupported assertion - so it isn’t addressed.

Moving on:

The schools are not divisive. Fully 76 of the 77 British citizens convicted under the Terrorism Act of 2000 attended a secular state school; the exception was home-schooled.

And this is meant to be serious journalism? When an author manages two complete non-sequiturs in 6 sentences, they need to be denied the oxygen of publicity. It doesn’t matter how many citizens arrested under the Terrorism Act attended secular schools; that’s simply not the point.

Faith schools are inherently divisive. They encourage pupils to conform to the tenets of a certain religion and inculcate a sense of community with others of that religion; they thus perpetuate faith communities. These faith communities are seperate and frequently opposed to each other. In a word, they’re divided - and faith schools perpetuate this. So, actually, it’s got nothing to do with arrests under the Terrorism Act of 2000 and more to do with the socio-cultural implications of telling a child they’re different to other children because of what’s written in an ancient tome.

But there’s more:

Faith schools do not charge parents for places. Although some schools did ask for voluntary contributions from parents even before admission, these pay for extra teaching for religious studies and, in the case of Jewish schools, for protection.

So, what you’re saying is that they do charge parents money and so exclude low-income families? A “voluntary contribution” before admissions sounds suspiciously like one on which admission could hang. Nothing would need said; the very fact that the charge comes before admission would simply worry parents, who then pay out just in case something goes wrong with the application goes through.

Not that those charges would be necessary in a secular school anyway; surely, “protection” money is required because of the school’s very insularity? The group seperates itself off from the community; that community is left in ignorance of that group’s traditions and finds it harder to challenge prejudices; the prejudiced, meanwhile, have an easy target in the isolated group. They’re not asking for it - but they’re hardly making the problem better.

Ed Balls’s attack fed, and amplified, the strident secularist stereotyping of faith schools as ghettoes that teach a backward mentality.

Let’s check a popular definition of the term, “Ghetto”: “a part of a city, especially a slum area, occupied by a minority group.” Substitute, “education system,” for, “city, especially a slum area,” and, actually, that’s about right. A faith school sets itself up as a seperate entity within the state education system justifying its existence by its religious status - an educational ghetto.

In fact, Labour’s own Commission on Integration and Cohesion found that faith schools support local communities in terms of sharing their resources, and generating social capital.

Note the strange jargon to confuse the uninitiated; “social capital,” is an evasive non-phrase straight out of a sociology textbook. The author again misses the point; the schools might support their own, local communities, but their perpetuation of an insular, religious mentality seperates them from the national community (such as it is) and so is divisive.

Moreover, faith schools are crucial in the emancipation of Muslim girls: those who attend Muslim schools are more than twice as likely to go on to higher education than those who attend secular state or independent schools.

Perhaps more importantly, they’re more than twice as likely to have the doctrines of a religion elements of which treat women as second-class citizens forced on them. As they would do with a Christian or Jewish school; the patriarchal elements of Abrahamic faiths are inescapable.

Very emancipating.

As for the urban myth that faith schools teach creationism in science classes, this is precisely indeed a myth.

Now this just needs editting; “precisely indeed”? Ugh…

Faith schools have an excellent academic record, serve their local communities, and ground their students in a religious as well as national identity. Why squander this force for good?

Because they ground their students in a religious identity, and because that grounding is tax-funded. Parents have the right to educate their children as they wish, so long as that doesn’t harm the child; but they don’t have the right to do so on other taxpayers. All parents fund the education system. That system should thus be open to the children of any parent at any point, regardless of faith. That requires universally secular state schools; that requires an end to state funding for faith schools. Simple, really.

Oh - and since when was a religious and national identity a force for good? Division is the word she’s looking for.

For Ed Balls – and Gordon Brown – the answer is obvious: to woo the “old Labour” rump of the party, equally committed to secularism and comprehensive education.

Or maybe it’s because they believe in an open and fair education for all children?

With an eye to the No 10 succession, Balls is setting himself up as the old Labour candidate by bashing faith schools.

This is just laughable. Balls is setting himself up as Old Labour - by bashing faith schools? Odone could at least do the scaremongering properly and realise that the Labour left aren’t very well disposed to Balls because of City Academies and more. They care about socialism as well as secularism.

He deserves to fail.

Oh, look, another unsubstantiated point. Typical, no?

McCain’s latest advert is a light-hearted mockery of Obama’s change mantra. The message appears to be “the only thing he has changed is the Presidential seal - he can do that on Photoshop!”

But after watching the advert, I get the distinct impression that voters may see it differently. “Obama on Mt Rushmore! Obama on the Statue of Liberty! Obama on our $1 bills! Obama’s so American, and not at all foreign or Muslim!”

I am amazed McCain is wasting money contradicting the tripe he spews about his opponent!

Both Blogged or Otherwise, both in Theory and Application

I was planning a write-up of some kind (hideously late though it inarguably would have been) but it turns out that Penny Red beat me to the punch:

Fashionably late to the party, this week I went to a massively interesting liberal bloggers’ event at the Guardian. It was fantastic to finally meet people I’ve spent so long sparring with online; that awkward shuffling when a roomful of geeky people who know each other well but haven’t actually met and are trying, shyly, to match faces to cyberspace handles felt pleasingly zeitgeist as always. It was the second part of the evening, the panel on women’s blogs, feminist blogs and their interaction with the rest of the blogsphere, that really got my hackles raised.

Basically, that was it for me as well. Entirely. That was my evening. The only point at which our views diverge is upon the exact nature of the annoyance posed, which is a pretty ineluctable given that she’s a feminist and insofar as I can be classified along such lines I’m far more the post-. The consequences of the feminist movement and both its successes and failures have left a world far more complex and variable than that which preceded it and all that.

In short I found the second half of the discussion by far the weaker. I think the greatest error was people asking the Freudian “What to feminist bloggers want?” when such a question is as great an absurdity as asking “What do liberal blogger want?”, if not more so. There is a vast amount of diversity within that ideology and a vast amount of different people who have been pinned with the tag, so expecting to nail down what all of them, to a writer, desire is an obvious impossibility.

As far as I could tell the assembled views of the panel were simple and easily appreciable. They consisted of more credit, more attention, less abuse and more interaction.

Apparently the feminist blogosphere (I detest that term as much as Penny does yet can find no superior) despises men assuming that they will become their leaders. This appears to be a wide-spread concern but, as far as I can tell, has not actually been attempted. If evidence of as much is forthcoming then I shall revise my position but I’ve never met anyone expressing an interest in leading the feminists in any direction and struggle to see why anyone would.

The matter of abuse is something which we (that is to say, SES) have had some experience. Indeed the only commenteers we seemed able to attract in our early days were people delivering death threats, posting images of recently evacuated foecal carcass and so on. As one of the bloggers present at the Liberal Conspiracy who had “Lived online as a man” for a year had found this is in no way limited to female bloggers, it is simply a matter of the terms of abuse shifting as gender appropriate (although “Bitch”, to a degree, can cover either). As far as I am concerned the best form of moderation there is is minimal moderation. If the consequences hurt anyone’s feelings then I suggest that they read up on the Stoics. I assure Penny and anyone else concerned that if this leads them to deem me a “Typical man” then this displays more of their prejudices than of my character. As with most earnest insults.

So with that criticism of the myn dealt with I suppose I should respond in kind by making two points concerning feminist blogs in Britain, both of which are informed by some consideration of the state of affairs across the Atlantic, before a third which concludes matters:

Insularity

(Or, when referring to America, “Incestuousness”.)

This was something which concerned me immensely concerning British feminist blogs but we’ve had three feminist bloggers comment here this week and they seem to make up the considerable majority of commenteers here (at least for now). So really, I can’t complain. Not least because otherwise they might all leave, which would upset us all immensely.

But certainly I had heard little from the feminists prior to the aforementioned gathering. And the state across the pond is simply dire. There vast blogs can be found with thriving communities that consist seemingly entirely of feminist women. This is not terrible in itself but it seems that for the most part it seems that this results in views supporting the feminist ideology being provided and then getting a plethora of reactions (generally shocked or outraged or bitterly amused about something) from hundreds of feminists. All saying nearly the same thing and generally coming from much the same position.

Occasionally there is a moment of schism such as whenever someone mentions pornography and the distinction between Dworkin acolytes and contemporary thinkers becomes stark, or when the Male Rights types show up or somebody mentions male mutilation standard in America while the treatment of Egyptian girls is under discussion (the latter two often coincide, and fair play to the otherwise platform devoid chaps) but really, it’s mostly unproductive noise focused around ideological consensus and resulting rhetorical hegemony.

Which has its purpose, I suppose, but if their interest is smashing the patriarchy achieves roughly fuck all. The result is a group of people with a view points of considerable divergence but largely the same set of views agreeing on almost everything and occasionally breaking out into a furious flame-war. I suppose that most involved enjoy themselves, but upon their own terms it doesn’t really get anyone anywhere. For instance, it fails completely in getting any men involved besides the (very occasional) male feminist and the Men’s Rights who come there to get some attention from the only people who really respond (albeit by telling them to GTFO and stop bringing the males into a discussion not about them), or just to troll their enemies hard (male rights advocacy is something which warrants its own article, suffice it to say that they’re a diverse bunch).

This suits the sort of segregationist feminists who wish to divide from masculinity and males altogether and form their own gender seperatist lesbian colonies but these are perhaps the least desirable and (thankfully) amongst the smallest faction of feminists around (even Dworkin suggested remaining within the patriarchy, albeit only in order to “begin to tear male dominance to pieces, to pull it apart, to vandalize it, to destabilize it, to mess it up, to get in its way, to fuck it up.”) The rest of the ideology presumably desires some sort of interaction and if it happens elsewhere I’ve seen scanty evidence.

The phrase “Preaching to the choir” comes to mind and much though it is over-used it does seem apt.

So what can British bloggers do to evade this fate? What they’re doing already, for the most part (and I say that, of course, objectively and entirely apart from the desire to see our “Recent Comments” bar remain in motion) but also trying to get more men engaged at all costs. Sunny, our host at the Liberal Conspiracy do, has apparently described himself as a feminist; but is amongst very sparse company. The F Word has no male contributers and as far as I am aware neither does the Carnival of Feminists. Needless to say the same is true of Feministe, Feministing and all the other large collaborative American feminist blogs. This I find curious: men make up half the population yet are represented as 0% of the feminist writers on all of the mainstream feminist blogs. Bizarre. So much for “You don’t have to be a woman to be a feminist” (always, I note, with that emphasis). It seems that this possibility is not a reality, or at least not to a great enough extent to merit inclusion of any instances. Perhaps the quality of these rarities is sub-standard? I find this curious too. Let us not forget that the work of any female feminist can be at least matched by Mill’s On Women.

If such establishments wish to encourage male feminism then simply offering them a platform would not be a bad place to start, as would simply not writing articles such as this which are both intimidating in length (as you can probably tell brevity is entirely my specialty) and also seemingly place the emphasis entirely upon what must be done by men (”Sarcasm and satire aren’t always easy to get across, so it’s probably safer not to start flinging around gendered insults” it is insisted, as if women are entirely incapable of telling when my calling them “moronic wenches” is in jest (always) or earnest (never) and should take no effort to improve their observational and interpersonal skills if they are not. No, the fault here lies purely with the men).

Instead they should simply let people turn up, refrain from treating anyone as if they don’t belong and for the sake of the stars turn off comment moderation. This blog has barely any comments as it is, prior to our current comments policy (don’t mention Oliv*r K*mm or H*rry’s Pl*ce and you can stay up unedited) and the removal of com-mod it was effectively dead. I am aware that many feminist websites already have thriving communities, but these doubtless could become expanded upon by reducing restrictions. A considerable number of people (myself unquestionably included) are so opinionated the prospect of having to await “Approval” for their views being plastered across a webpage is considerably irksome.

Finally there is the matter of linking to feminists and so on. This is not the sort of matter which I or any other blogger I know of (or can envision) does by quota. If something worthwhile is seen that seems to warrant distribution then that is exactly what is done. So far the only time that this has happened to my recollection with a feminist site was Penny Red’s, which both Douglas and I have linked to and I’ve commented on a fair few times. Now that we’re getting incomings and comments from blogs of that nature doubtless reciprocation will follow so that all seems to be in hand from this front. As far as I can tell this is the only way to proceed and really, it’s how all bloggers interact. Nothing ideological about it, purely social.

Ineffectuality

(There’s nothing like a word you’ve just invented to form the central foundation of a critique.)

Again, let us compare the state of our nation (how wary I am of that phrase) to that of those across the Atlantic Puddle in terms of this ideology and its accompanying movement. In America when women seemed threatened with abortion being restricted, limited or outlawed a few years ago feminists marched a million women on Washington.

Never mind the national news in America, that filled copious column inches here in Britain. It was a remarkable event and a sterling achievement, one that made apparent the often disregarded political clout of the pro-choice movement. This demonstration staged something of a reset upon the terms of debate, which had previously seemed to dangle the prospect of a move upon Roe versus Wade by some political authority or other, a goal overwhelmingly coveted by the substantial political force of the theologically inspired far-right, which at that time had thrown its support whole-heartedly behind the wholly dominant Republican Party. Afterwards the reactionary forces were forced into if not a retreat then at least a lull. Their hope for statist dominance over the female body faded, if not their desire.

Now let us be fair to British feminists. The population of America is far vaster than our own. Even including such conditions as inter-state travel we must accept that they had a far larger pool to fish activists from. But with that in mind surely it would be reasonable to set the point of comparison at a modest ten thousand women marching upon Westminster?

Well this year Nadine “Mad Nad” Dorries spearheaded efforts to reduce the number of weeks after which an abortion could legally occur. I was aware of her efforts since I read newspapers. I was aware of opposition because it was included within them. I knew that Nadine Dorries was a nut because of Ben Goldacre and his glorious blog and its numerous critiques of her output. I had seen her case demolished in Penny Red here where she matches each of the 24 “reasons” provided by Dorries with a far better one. I knew Goldacre from the Guardian and knew of Red through a mutual friend.

But there was no immense protest that I could not have helped but notice. There was nothing that demostrated widespread opposition in a fashion that was impossible to dispute. There was not five digits of feminists joining Brian Haw on the Westminster lawn of Parliament Square.

This is entirely inadequate. It is far from sufficient to offer information to those interested, attention must be seized. This can not be achieved through a few blog posts, but only through a campaign. This is not the sort of affair that British feminism appears to have achieved in this decade, and it shall almost certainly have to before the decade is out.

There was a great fuss made at the Liberal Conspiracy meet (and perhaps elsewhere, I haven’t been bothered to check) over who was and deserved to take “Credit” for the Commons rejection of the proposed increase of the limit. But as far as I’m concerned the British Public is owed the most as, above all else, the most important reason for the abortion laws remaining the same is that there are more Labour MPs than Conservative MPs. After the next election there will be more Conservative MPs than Labour MPs and the measure will be passed.

Is that as inevitable as I presented it? Not entirely, but given the current approach of the feminists (not to mention the Labour Party) of Britain I would suggest that, barring some unlikely shift of strategy, that is what shall occur. This is partially the consequence of the aforementioned insularity but partially the result of the weakness of British feminism. The reasons for this are numerous but I would argue that it is largely the consequence of it being less necessity for its existence here than elsewhere.

It is at this point that I can feel fists clenching but this view has been under consideration for some time.

Redundancy & Malaprop

It is often argued that Thatcher killed off British socialism. This incorrect, that was Callaghan. Thatcher killed British feminism. Once the reactionary party of Britain had been led by a woman, a woman unashamdly of the petty bourgeois, no less, and it was a woman who had kept them in power for well over a decade there was no longer any hope for the ideology which asserted that society was based around the oppression of one gender by another. Had it perhaps been the progressives of Labour or even the Liberals who had placed a PM into power then feminism in Britain would have stood a chance. It wasn’t. It was Thatcher. It was the Conservative Party. She thought that men were weak, she fought them, she won. As matters stand feminists are trying to forge a movement in a nation where loathsome organisations offer better insurance premiums to those in possession of a vagina; since apparently that renders them “Better drivers” (yes, all of them) and Polly Toynbee often digresses from her polite statist leftism to tell us how useless her husband is.

Amongst many, many others.

Yes, the malaise within British feminism is far from confined to their treatment of the internet. As far as solutions for this are concerned I have nothing to offer. This is because it is here that I consider the conventional feminist viewpoint to disintegrate: the patriarchy was a model in existence but has since seen partial collapse while the cultural lie of men and women being somehow innately distinct in ways that are utterly inherent has, largely remained strong. Requiring men to be perceived as inferior in certain ways as severely as women were and (in many ways) still are; although often less challenged. This is a state of affairs that has left both men and women treated injustly; but is a system so complex and convoluted that any understanding which begins from the premise of master and servant can not stand a fraction of a chance of hoping to depict the situation accurately. Any that hopes to stamp out misogyny and focuses on as much is forgetting misandry, and thus in reverse.

This differs in numerous, obvious ways with feminism; but perhaps not as greatly as may be assumed intuitively. There are a number of shared aims and intentions. I agree with much of the feminist agenda. I agree, above all else, with this:

After generations of struggle, we are still trying to build a better world, one where gender does not dictate behaviour and assumptions and opportunities.

but struggle to see how any collective following an ideology named “Feminism” can succeed in “laying the foundations” for as much. I’m willing to stage an attempt at such a venture with anyone willing to engage but I question the logic of approaching it using the exact same vehicle that tore through the Patriarchy. Especially when the consequences, indeed the tools, of that messy demolition included a surge of caustic misandry that presently coats our culture like some nauseating fume.

I further agree entirely with the rational feminist criticism of the prejudice based around what amounts to a different set of genitals. I oppose the idea of genders for much the same reason I do nations: they are cultural notions with merit but which cause problems in total disproportion to their value. They belong in the ever increasing pile of obsolete ideas generated by cultural progress throughout history. As ideas they are entirely within the power of humans to alter as appropriate or else completely dispose of. This may be a struggle but it is unquestionably a possibility. But this is not the sort of endeavour that can be undertaken by a movement which, from its name to its membership, is entirely suited more to one gender than the other. It requires engagement of both and mass support capable of overwhelming entirely existing social norms, neither of which has been achieved by feminism previously or seems to be a plausible aim for the future. What is required is that feminists live up to this talk of women being “Collaborative rather than competitive” in destroying the crux of all such preconceptions alongside their entirely required comrades. It seems that some have realised this; but with a mentality that sees man as the oppressor and woman his victim hamstringing their understanding of contemporary existence there is little hope of immense progress.

So the best offer I can make here is that the feminists stop being as much and start tearing down the gender roles alongside the partners that without they can never accomplish such an epic feat. Those currently designated as “men”.

Or at least get a few more feet on the streets and kick up a proper fuss.

From henceforth I’ve scrapped the pseudonym “R.E. Vamp”. Largely because I was sick of not having a proper first name that people could address me by.

According to Google Analytics somebody found us through a search for ‘were where the ergo clocks made’, ’sexy unrestricted sites for small boys’, ‘why was Sir Keith Park in the news lately’, ‘eat your own shit’ and, a personal favourite, ‘”work harder for” cock’.

I don’t know whether to be more worried about our readership or our site’s content. Regardless, welcome to the website. SES is a broad church.

Barely any coverage beyond the aforelinked on the Respect collapse. No word on the SWP website and only a brief mention for this major disaster on the Respect (SWP/Left List) website. That can be found here and I can’t help but find it more than a little folorn.

Respect/Left List supporters will continue to oppose New Labour and the other establishment parties.

They say, fully in the knowledge that such resistance will be futile.

We know that many in the working class movement look on the decline of the Labour government with mounting concern and desparately want a real left alternative.

They say, knowing that they are not it.

Respect may well be:

A party that struggles against war and the racism it breeds.

But given the ongoing (indeed, in Afghanistan escalating) war and the success of the BNP over the Labour Party in Henley and in the GLA elections earlier this year it looks like this is a struggle which they are increasingly failing.

Respect Renewal, meanwhile, took a chance to jab at the SWP/LL Respect, saying:

The defection of the three Left List councillors ought to sound the death knell of the Left List fiasco and finally lays to rest the lie that the split in Tower Hamlets Respect was between left and right.

Which was also the Left List Respect’s statement, except that they said that they were the ones on the left. Rather like the “No you’re the Neo-Nazi” exchange the BNP had going recently, only in reverse. It seems like either side is desperate to tar themselves as the extremists here.

RR also claim that one of the Respect (SWP, confused yet?) members joined the Tories, not something I have seen claimed anywhere else but certainly interesting and worthy of investigation.

As for Respect, Renewal says that:

They are determined to be more coherent and effective following what we are sure will be the last defection.

Also:

The split away from Respect by the SWP is now well and truly behind us. We look forward to playing our part in furthering the left as a whole, not simply our part of it.

So who knows, perhaps they might even be forced to try unity through sheer desperation? I wouldn’t count on it…

Both articles refer to the Labour Party as “New Labour” and neither seem to display much acceptance of culpability. Same old revolutionary politics, then.

Meanwhile, no word from Lenin’s Tomb. Presumably he’s still awaiting programming from Central Committee, or else they simply want this story buried. Democratic Centralism gets in the way of rapid reporting awfully…

Finally, if you want to see some socialists losing it completely then, as usual check out Socialist Unity, here and here. As ever, the deepest joys are to be found the murky depths of the site’s comment section. Consider this:

SWP members should now be asking themselves why after decades of political engagement, the party is still unable to build long-term and deep roots in communities that should be its natural constituencies.

I’m trying to create some witty addition to that, but “LOL, PWNED” is all that comes to mind, really.

That’s all from the far-left today. If you’re hoping for more I doubt you’ll be dissapointed but if you were under any delusions about them mattering even slightly then I would suggest now would be a good point to move on.

How did I miss this? It upsets me it took until 1665 to reach my attention.

Ali will no doubt come and remonstrate with me about this soon for numerous doctrinal errors. But - say goodbye to half of the Anglican Church, comrades. Observe:

The Anglican Church faces what is in effect a schism this weekend after the declaration last night of conservative evangelicals to create a “church within a church”. The new body, called the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, will have its own bishops, clergy and theological colleges.

The conservatives enjoy irrelevance, it seems. They don’t understand that erecting a wall around themselves will simply further cut them off from reality. Their ideas are rooted in a dogmatic, hardline interpretation of an ancient socio-cultural text not known for its consistent practical relevance. That ancient culture no longer exists; and so its stranger emanations simply don’t wash anymore.

“Modernising” Christians (hah…) get this. They realise that the bigoted fury of a vicious desert-society rests at odds with modern civilisations (such as they are) - but argue a relevant message rests beneath. Very debatable; but a more pragmatic approach to doctrine does allow them slightly more leeway in fighting the losing battle that is attempting to convince the public of a scientific age to believe in the sky-god. They can drop they hair-shirted adulterer-stoning no-wearing-clothes-of-two-materials bit and try and address the issues relevant to modern life.

So - part of the Anglican church drops away and seals itself off to new converts. The rest, meanwhile, goes on as usual - but looks weaker. Humanity looks on puzzled at a sectarian squabbling which for many outside the church equates to a dispute over whether God is a sky-fairy or a cosmic-pixie. And then decides religion is clearly barmy. Just so long as nobody dies for it…

Via Daily Kos:

Reporter: “When was the last time you pumped your own gas and how much did it cost?”

MCCAIN: “Oh, I don’t remember. Now there’s Secret Service protection. But I’ve done it for many, many years. I don’t recall and frankly, I don’t see how it matters.“

McCain doesn’t know how much it costs Americans to live. So - when are those elitist headlines the media clobbered Obama with going to start?

Oh, wait. He’s a Republican - and thus clearly a national hero who’s loyal service requires secret service protection which stops him from filling up his car in case those nasty terrists blow him up. Clearly.

Making a massive fuss out of his triumph, of course, in a fashion which is rather reminiscent of Hillary Clinton crowing over victory in Michigan, a state where Obama was not even upon the ballot. Except, obviously, this is far more consequential.

As ever though, after the oppression comes the party and Zanu (PF) are seemingly having a lovely knees-up to rejoice in their leader remaining in power. If you didn’t read the fine article on Zimbabwe’s problems and the ruling party that was published in yesterday’s Saturday Times then you really should. I unfortunately cannot fault his stingingly anti-interventionist critique of the call to arms heard at present in certain circles {in much the same way that Mia Farrow requested Blackwater save Darfur} but hold out some hope of Simba staging a coup.

Which is a long-shot but the best hope we have. Irrespective of legitimate authority within Zimbabwe the real power rests with the generals, who have declared themselves unwilling to serve under a leader outside that Zanu (PF). Especially the loathed MDC. This does not, however, exclude an internal challenger from within the party, which is what Mugabe has.

As for Mr. Tsvangirai, well I’m simply surprised (and glad) that he hasn’t ended up dead. I hope that this will remain the case as Mugabe wishes him to serve as a figurehead for futility instead of a martyr against tyranny but I have my doubts. Mugabe seems interested in consolidation in his quickly solidifying position of President for Life and doubtless the death of his principle rival comes under the grim remit of this brutal process.