But a better world is necessary I will not cease from mental fight, Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand Till we have built Jerusalem In England’s green and pleasant land. William Blake’s Jerusalem A Facebook friend of mine said to me: If you can show me a practical…

The demise of the imperial gentleman When I was a child in the 1960s we were taught that we should behave like gentlemen. This meant a few things that might seem a little weird now. Gentlemen were, of course, men, and in the language and perceptions of the time strong and powerful. …

Escape from McMurder Incorporated There is no need to despair. The recent revelations in the Labour party about sabotage by principle-free centrists is a good thing, it’s helping release energy that would have been wasted worrying about which meaningless Labour committee the left should try to take over to do more constructive things like…

2020 vision — the broader picture The Blair/Clinton and friends project represented the final flowering of the old post war consensus, but of course Thatcher and Regan had already torn up the old social contract it was built on. It was doomed as a vehicle for carrying it forward, but that was not its purpose. The…

What happened to the working class? In this section I will draw on the stats quoted in Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race when Reni Eddo-Lodge discusses the British working class. The shaping of the argument is entirely mine, however. The myth of the white working class First, the old industrial working class in Birmingham, Northern England, North Wales…

Racism — useful idiocy for dividing people We share a common ancestor with chimps. We have about 93% of the same DNA. Within the human population itself 97% of the DNA is common. So, this 3% that’s left is the source of all the variation in people you see. This is an amazing thought. On its own…

Triangulation Let’s cover the intellectual roots of modern centrism, such as they are. Say you have nothing in mind but to get elected for whatever reason and by any means because it’s your party’s “turn”. You have two potential constituencies that might vote for you but they want things that conflict…

Centrism the myth We’ve all heard the adage about how the left and the right cannot agree and the proper course is in the centre. Clinton and Blair did a lot of posturing about the third way, and the principle-free concept of triangulation. Initially they mostly they said it was in fact a…