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Daniel Hannan

" “How, as a socialist, can you not be an anti-Semite?” Adolf Hitler asked his party members in 1920. No one thought it an odd question. Anti-Semitism was at that time widely understood to be part of the broader revolutionary movement against markets, property and capital.

"The man who coined the term “socialism,” the nineteenth-century French revolutionary, Pierre Leroux, had told his comrades: “When we speak of the Jews, we mean the Jewish spirit – the spirit of profit, of lucre, of gain, of speculation; in a word, the banker’s spirit.”

"The man who popularised the term “anti-Semitism” had taken a similar line. Wilhelm Marr, a radical nineteenth-century German Leftist, may not have been the first person to use the word, but he certainly – and approvingly – brought it to a wide audience: “Anti-Semitism is a Socialist movement,” he pronounced, “only nobler and purer in form than Social Democracy”."

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these are not leading questions - i insist [71-page pdf]

[Document p.20, or pdf p.26 ]

What is special about your school?
Why?
What are the reasons why your school is an outstanding school?

Be assured, despite the self-congratulatory waffle, this school is clearly doing better than the average and is a considerable improvement of standards a decade ago and more.

The bottom line is they are getting actual results, by far and away the most (only?) useful measure.

These standards, however, remain way below what can be achieved, but they are starting with poor material far too late. Further, many start with limited English (if any). The schools are concentrating on added value, which is as it should be.

From the 2008 census figures for Lambeth: half the children are 'black', divided into at least 4 categories of 'black'.

Black Caribbean (24%),
Black African (23%),
Mixed Race (13%),
White British (9%),
Portuguese (6%),
Black Other (6%),
White Other(9%)
and a small number of Bangladeshi,
Chinese, Turkish, White Irish, and Pakistani

The linked pdf summarises three primary schools. I have extracted from the entry for the first of the three listed.

They pointed out during the interview and focus group discussion how much they enjoy coming to school and also expressed how proud they are about how well they are doing at the school.
They also gave a number of reasons why the school is a special school and outstanding including:

‘You always learn new things’
‘Because you get to know each other better’
‘Everyone at playtime and during lessons they are always happy’
‘We work as a team’
‘Our school is special because we have someone to play with we have friendship buddies’
‘They ask us how we feel about stuff because everyone in the school is different’
'Our school is special because everyone is diverse. It is a multicultural school and we love it’
‘Our school is special because we respect the environment’
‘We have a team meeting’
‘Our school is special because they always encourage us with outstanding behaviour’
‘The school is welcoming'

The 71-page pdf is chock full of PC waffle. The pdf formatting is worse then amateurish.

"Black History Month
The Obamas,
Rosa Parks,
Amazing Adventures of Mary Seacole,
Year 3: Second World War
Year 4: Aboriginal Australia
Year 5: Windrush
Year 6: From Apartheid to Peace Nelson Mandela

Chair of governors (eek)

"...no gap exists between FSM and non FSM. FSM pupils do better than non FSM."
[FSM = free school meals and is widely used as a measure of poverty/'deprivation']

From franchise by examination, education and intelligence (published online on23/10/1999)

1) Best teaching practices would, from my experience, have approximately 90% of 16 year olds through 4 ‘A’ grade GCSEs at 16 years of age (currently this standard is achieved by 13.2% of 16 year olds).

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seeking someone to blame...

Abstract from 18 points on "the failure of complex systems".

7) Post-accident attribution accident to a ‘root cause’ is fundamentally wrong.
Because overt failure requires multiple faults, there is no isolated ‘cause’ of an accident. There are multiple contributors to accidents. Each of these is necessary insufficient in itself to create an accident. Only jointly are these causes sufficient to create an accident. Indeed, it is the linking of these causes together that
creates the circumstances required for the accident. Thus, no isolation of the ‘root cause’ of an accident is possible. The evaluations based on such reasoning as ‘root cause’ do not reflect a technical understanding of the nature of failure but rather the social, cultural need to blame specific, localized forces or events for outcomes.
...
8) ... Hindsight bias remains the primary obstacle to accident investigation...
...
14) Change introduces new forms of failure.
The low rate of overt accidents in reliable systems may encourage changes, especially the use of new technology, to decrease the number of low consequence but high frequency failures. These changes maybe actually create opportunities for new, low frequency but high consequence failures....

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Complexity: The emerging science at the edge of order and chaos by M. Mitchell Waldrop
	Simon & Schuster, pbk, 1993 ISBN-10: 0671872346 ISBN-13: 978-0671872342 $11.95 amazon.co.uk
Programming the universe: a quantum computer scientist takes on the cosmos by Seth Lloyd see Chapter 1000: Complexity simplified [pp. 176-211] {Note: 1000 is 8 in binary.}
	Vintage; Reprint edition, pbk 2007 ISBN-10: 1400033861 ISBN-13: 978-1400033867 $14.22 amazon.co.uk	Kindle edition Vintage Digital, 2011 776 KB ASIN: B004ZLS3TU $11.42 [amazon.com] {advert}
	Also see Measures of Complexity, a non--exhaustive list by Seth Lloyd.

religion increases scepticism - 'scientists' are easily depressed

“Confidence in evolution, the Big Bang, the age of the Earth, and climate change decline sharply as belief in a supreme being rises,”writes the Associated Press. According to the AP, when the news organization shared the results of the poll with several prominent scientists, they became “depress[ed] and upset” by the findings.

"When asked if they were confident that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old, a mere 27 percent of those polled said they were “extremely” confident, while 36 percent said they were “not too” or “not at all” sure." Why should 27 percent be 'mere'? Of all the people I know, maybe two of them could, if asked, tell you that the Earth is, apparently, 4.5 billion years old. I'm old enough to have seen the scientists change their mind over things like this several times in the past (as you'd expect), so why should they not change their minds again? Would you be completely amazed to wake up in the morning to see a headline like 'Boffins decide Earth is 6 billion years old, after all.'? Having become used to the very strange idea that all space and time was created in the 'Big Bang', was I completely surprised to see a Horizon documentary called 'What happened before the big bang?'
[Quoted from sciencerecorder.com]

What is impressive is the 'certainty' of 'scientists' opposed to the scepticism of 'religious' people. This is a very interesting article inasmuch as the responses are so heavily weighed by Leftist scribblers who seem to believe in 'science' in the manner they imagine 'the religious' believe 'religion'.

In The laughing prophet: the seven virtues and G. K. Chesterton [Methuen, 1937], Emile Cammaerts [1878-1953] merged the following two quotes:

“It’s drowning all your old rationalism and scepticism, it’s coming in like a sea; and the name of it is superstition. … It's the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense.” [The Oracle of the Dog, 1923, in The Incredulity of Father Brown, G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936)] [1]
and
“You all swore you were hard-shelled materialists; and as a matter of fact you were all balanced on the very edge of belief - of belief in almost anything.” [The Miracle of Moon Crescent, 1924, in The Incredulity of Father Brown, G.K. Chesterton] [2]
into this paraphrase:
“The first effect of not believing in God is to believe in anything.”

"How confident Americans are in things like evolution, the Big Bang, climate change and the age of the Earth depends heavily on religion and political affiliation, the poll revealed. Democrats, for example, expressed more confidence in these views than their Republican counterparts, which showed the connection between political affiliation and their scientific beliefs." and even the title:- "Nobel Prize Winner Says Science Ignorance Is Pervasive"
[Quoted from ibtimes.com]

Note here also the continual reaching for 'authority' on the Left, instead of for argument or reason. The same was prominent in the list of the fifty-one (mostly Leftist!) so-called 'humanists' who recently attacked David Cameron for saying Britain is a Christian county. Concurrently, leader of the (Socialist) Opposition, Ed Miliband said in an interview in Israel, that Britain is a "Christian country".

"Britain, he said in an interview, is a ‘Christian country’ despite declining observance, and he strongly believes religion ‘nourishes people."
[Quoted from dailymail.co.uk, with none of the faux-outrage usual from Lefty media.]

It is Lefties who cling to dogma as to a fundamentalist religion, acting as fanatically as any fundamentalist in pursuit of that religion. They have similar commitment to which they cling to their religion, even to the extent of getting in a tizz about people doubting the Big Bang. As if that even matters much, or is yet subject to much more than a certain consistency in the math models.

This present 'story' has all the Marxmen in a fit, mostly because the more religious are more sceptical than themselves (not even making an outright rejection of the scientific theories). Yet they express their outrage by attacking the beliefs of others.

Humans seem very driven to believe something, whatever that may be, and take sides with about as much judgement and moderation as football fans!

n.u.t. union to call for still more dumbing down

Another delegate said:-

"Teaching a child is a clear case of child abuse. Parents who teach their children, in an attempt to make them more successful than the average, should have the children removed by 'socialist' 'services' immediately and with no appeal. This outrage should be stopped immediately and the parents sentenced to exemplary terms of hard labour."

 

Another said:-

"It's obvious that the Tories are plotting to let some children do better than others, while making us work. It's an outrage."

Miliband will present his latest policies on the closing day of the N.U.T. conference.

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maria miller - is cameron protecting a corrupt mp?

75% thought Cameron was wrong to offer support [Figures from the Daily Mail]

David Cameron has a duty to back the rule of law unconditionally.

80% of the electorate think that she should go

By what power or authority?

73% thought her 32 second apology was a farce

Who cares? It's a side issue. Would you rather she put on more of an act for the gallery?

66% think she should lose her powers over press regulation

So should they all.

68% think she should be sacked as an MP

By what power or mechanism? Maria Miller is an elected representative of the people. Which form of dictatorship do you favour?

He is also protecting her because he and Osborne have fiddled a few figures in order to make people believe the country is clmbing out of the doldrums just in time for a feel good factor before elections.

If every trough-er were removed from parliament, half the Conservative Party, a greater part of the Lib-Dems and the overwhelming majority of ‘New’ Labour would be out of parliament.

Britain has suffered quite enough from 15 years of socialists like Bliar trying to undermine the law.

Maybe this will help our readers to grasp the problems:-

When a man takes an oath, Meg, he’s holding his ownself in his own hands. Like water. And if he opens his fingers then – he needn’t hope to find himself again.
—
Margaret: “Father, the man is bad.”
More: “There’s no law against that.”
Roper: “There is a law against it. God’s law.”
More: “Then God can arrest him.”
Roper: “Sophistication upon sophistication!”
More: “No. Sheer simplicity. The law, Roper, the law. I know what’s legal, but I don't always know what’s right. And I'm sticking with what’s legal.
Roper: “Then you set man’s law against God’s?”
More: “No. Far below. But let me draw your attention to a fact. I am not God. The currents and eddies of right and wrong, which you find such plain sailing, I can't navigate. I'm no voyager. But in the thickets of the law, there I am a forester. I doubt if there’s a man alive who could follow me there, thank God.”
Alice: “While you talk, he is gone.”
More: “And go he should, if he was the Devil himself, until he broke the law.”
Roper: “So now you'd give the Devil the benefit of law!”
More: “Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get to the Devil?”
Roper: “I'd cut down every law in England to do that!”
More: “Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you -- where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat. This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast -- man’s laws, not God’s -- and if you cut them down -- and you're just the man to do it -- do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of the law, for my own safety’s sake.”
[Robert Bolt, Man for All Seasons, play first performed in 1954]

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