Report led by Carol Vorderman says most pupils need to focus on learning everyday skills for finance and business GCSE maths should be split in two, offering deeper study for students with an aptitude for the subject while allowing other pupils to become fully numerate in a smaller area of the curriculum, according to a taskforce headed by the TV presenter Carol Vorderman. In a report commissioned by the Conservatives, Vorderman proposes adopting the model of English language and literature to split maths into twin GCSEs, so that some candidates can achieve a higher standard of maths in an area which includes topics such as personal finance, rather than receiving a “trickled down” version of the subject for more advanced students. Vorderman said: “In my view, it is pointless for most 14-year-olds starting their GCSE courses to be force-fed mathematical topics which they will never use, when what they desperately need is to become more comfortable with numbers including percentages and fractions used in the world of finance.” The report notes that while young people’s employment prospects are highly dependent on their level of maths knowledge, nearly half of all students fail to get a C grade or higher at GCSE maths, effectively failing the subject. Only 15% take maths in some form beyond GCSE. The report says: “Unless major alterations in our mathematics education are made and quickly, we are risking our future economic prosperity.” Roger Porkess, a former maths teacher and education specialist who is lead author of the report, said: “Future generations may well see this report as a turning point, the moment when it ceased to be acceptable for the education system to turn out large numbers of young people who are too frightened of maths to be able to use it at work and in everyday life.” Vorderman’s team recommends that all students should study maths until they are 18. This would not mean a compulsory A-level but a range of options for different needs and abilities. The report says maths should no longer be confined to a daily lesson but encouraged in other areas of pupils’ daily routine so that like English it is practised throughout the school day. The report warns that many primary school teachers are not adequately grounded in the subject to teach maths. Almost all recently qualified primary school teachers gave up maths themselves at age 16 after taking GCSE. Around a quarter of children in secondary schools are not taught by specialist maths teachers. It says that a child’s mathematical destiny is fixed at 11. Nine-tenths of those who fail to achieve the Sat target at 11 will go on to get below a C grade at GCSE. By contrast, 94% of those who surpass the Sat target will get a good GCSE pass. The report says almost all secondary schools ignore the results of the Sat and immediately retest children, even though around two school terms have been spent preparing for the Sat. The independent report owas commissioned by David Cameron and Michael Gove, now the education secretary, in 2009 and carried out by a task force assembled and led by Vorderman. Gove said: “As Carol and her team point out so powerfully, we are falling behind our competitors when it comes to mathematics education. British 15-year-olds’ mathematics skills are now more than two whole academic years behind 15-year-olds in Shanghai and the last decade has seen us plummet down the international league tables in both maths and science. “This comprehensive report, looking at all the important areas, will be of great help as the government continues its drive to equip our children with the skills that they need to compete with their global contemporaries and thrive in the 21st century.” In a speech to the Royal Society in June, Gove said he believed the “vast majority” of pupils should study maths to the age of 18. He said this should be a “new goal for the education system”. The education secretary suggested that calculus and statistics should play a part in the secondary curriculum. He said: “There are a vast array of issues that people are confronted with in daily life – from health scares to claims about the effect of drugs to financial news – which require statistical understanding. But studies have repeatedly shown how poor our collective understanding of such issues is.” Commenting on the report, Professor Dame Julia Higgins, chair of the independent Advisory Committee on Mathematics Education, said: “Carol’s work taps into one of the biggest concerns of not only the mathematics community but also of higher education and business, that too few people study mathematics up to the age of 18. “We need a broad set of mathematics qualifications that are designed to meet everyone’s needs – A-level mathematics alone can’t provide this. We hope that the government will act on this recommendation, as it is a key step to ensuring that future generations are suitably prepared for the challenges of a highly competitive and technologically dependent world. “At present, some students aren’t even studying mathematics up to 16 – early entry to GCSE mathematics is increasing dramatically and, with league tables in mind, some schools interpret achieving a grade C at the age of 14 as permission to drop the subject and focus their attention elsewhere. “The government needs to act now to clarify this situation and send the message that mathematics isn’t something you can just ‘get out of the way’ if you want to compete in the modern world.” Mathematics GCSEs Schools Jeevan Vasagar guardian.co.uk
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Practice of flights being displayed at low prices before further charges are added is to be looked at by European commission The European commission has launched an inquiry into airlines’ controversial “add-on” charges that allow them to offer low prices bearing little resemblance to what ticket buyers end up having to pay. Siim Kallas, a European commission vice-president, who is also the organisation’s transport commissioner, said he was concerned about the growing practice of airlines offering attractive, affordable, “headline prices” for flights that are then subject to baggage charges, credit and debit card fees, and airport check-in fees. The practice, already criticised by UK consumer groups , has been under the spotlight for being used, as a matter of course, by budget airlines such as Ryanair. But it is also a feature of scheduled carriers as well as train firms and rail websites. Amid growing concern that airlines exploit passengers by expanding the list of additional charges – which, at one stage, were routinely included in the basic fare – Kallas revealed that the commission shared his concerns about the confusing practices and admitted that spiralling consumer complaints were difficult to address within current laws. He has launched a study into whether EU rules need to be amended, which will report this autumn with legislative action expected next year. The inquiry follows pressure from the Labour MEP Brian Simpson, who is chair of the European parliament transport committee. He believes an investigation is long overdue. In a letter to Kallas, he said the “marked trend” of adding charges for basic services was “giving rise to serious concern”. He added: “Passengers have a right to receive basic services for … their air tickets. It is necessary to ensure price transparency.” He said the situation was similar to what happened with package holiday contracts; in that case, basic rules governing pricing of such holidays were set out in an EU directive. Simpson said he wanted to see airlines starting with a top price then deducting charges according to passenger choice, rather than starting with rock-bottom prices and adding on. Some carriers, he said, were advertising fares as low as €6 (£5.23). “It is impossible to fly for that. We need clarity,” he said. Simpson said the list of additional charges was growing. Ryanair had introduced an ” EU 261 levy “, which charges customers a fee to cover any compensation that might have to be paid under EU passenger rights legislation. “It doesn’t seem fair or appropriate to ask passengers to help cover the business risks of Ryanair.” The situation has been compounded by the ease of buying tickets online, where people may decline to cancel a transaction at a late stage as the extra charges kick in. Consumers have to agree with carriers’ terms and conditions to proceed with the transaction. In a letter to Simpson in July, Kallas announced the inquiry and said: “According to EU regulation 1008/2008 the final price of air fares should be indicated at all times, including taxes, charges and surcharges and fees, which are unavoidable or foreseeable. Commercial practice has, little by little, segregated specific services that may be avoidable (check-in at the counter, excess baggage weight, checked baggage), but which up to now have formed part of the basic fare. Such a pricing practice that could be defined as price unbundling or ‘a la carte’ may increase consumer choice but can also create confusion: the final price at the time of payment increasingly differs from the announced price, rendering price comparison impracticable and leading to frustration, and consumer mistrust.” Monique Goyens, director general of the European Consumers’ Organisation , said: “It’s high time the commission looks into this issue. More and more airlines charge their clients unnecessary high costs for paying by credit or debit card, inflating the price tag of flights advertised as low cost. Accepting card payments to buy a ticket is not a service delivered by a company. Passengers should not be charged for exaggerated and unjustifiable card fees. “The promotion of e-commerce is a top priority for Europe but consumers will not have trust in online commerce when they feel ripped-off when making a card payment on the internet.”Ryanair has not replied to the Guardian. An easyJet spokesman commented: “As we don’t charge for check-in or printing boarding cards, we feel it would be more appropriate for the airlines that do charge for these things to comment instead.” In June the UK’s Office of Fair Trading said it would be tackling “rip-off” surcharges levied on debit and credit card transactions by travel companies, particularly airlines, which it said raked in £300m by these means in 2009. Case study Nick Murton of Kent recently flew by easyJet from Gatwick to Edinburgh, expecting to pay £121 for two return seats. “My initial anger was that when booking the flight, at the very last second before confirming and clicking ‘payment’[the website] came up with a disgusting choice of ‘charges’ when paying: £8 for a debit card and £12.95 for a credit card. “Now, I am aware that there has been a lot of recent media debate on this subject and rightly so. It is appalling. Charging customers to pay for their tickets? I think it costs about 30p to process a card payment. I have been in business and have never charged a customer to pay me. “My anger was then compounded when checking in at 7am in the morning I was told I would have to pay £25 for my baggage. It was only a trolley on wheels – granted too big to take on board – but nonetheless, another outrageous last minute surprise. I then enquired about coming back and lo-and-behold was informed it would be a further £25 to bring my clothes home again. Do airlines honestly expect all their customers to travel away for three to four days and stay in the same set of clothes? “So, here I am finding myself with an extra £58 cost on top of my ticket price. Of course the chap at Gatwick explained that it would have been explained on their website, but their pricing structure and website bookings are so complicated and not transparent whatsoever. It was probably very small print, and one would expect to be able to take one case in the hold. “I feel totally and utterly ripped off and fleeced by this experience. And now I find it impossible to complain as there is no email address I can see to complain to, only an 0871 telephone number charging 10p per minute – another easyjet rip-off.” Airline industry European commission Easyjet Ryanair Regulators Consumer affairs Rebecca Smithers Mark King guardian.co.uk
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FTSE is expected to fall by more than 100 points as traders react to S&P’s downgrading of the US AAA credit rating, and the latest efforts to hold the Eurozone together 7.44am: Japan’s stock market has now closed after a pretty nervy session, but one where we didn’t see a full-blown panic. The Nikkei ended 2.18% lower at 9,097.56, down 202.32 points, having been as low as 9,057.29 at one stage. “The three main concerns are S&P’s downgrade of the U.S. debt rating, the ongoing European debt problems and inflation worries in China,” Masanaga Kono, chief strategist at Amundi Japan, told Reuters. Most Asian markets are still trading, and they are all suffering losses . China’s Shanghai Composite is down by over 4%. We’ll do a full round-up of the Asian markets once they’ve closed – they’ve already helped to set the mood in Europe…. 7.25am: The ECB’s pledge to start buying government bonds to prevent the crisis spreading further appears to be having an effect. My colleague Alex Hawkes has more details: Both Italy and Spain’s borrowing costs have dropped this morning, following indications from the European Central Bank that it would start buying the countries’ bonds to settle the markets. Yields on ten-year Italian bonds are down by almost half a percentage point to 5.6%, while Spanish bond yields have fallen 0.3 percentage points, to 5.7%. Traders suggested the move could be temporary, but any suggestion that Eurozone debts could be more manageable will help to limit the panic when the markets open at 8am. 7.18am: The Russian stock market has opened, and the main index promptly fell 3.5%. The 61 point fall to 1736 points pushed the RTS index to its lowest level for the year. More evidence that the shockwaves from the loss of America’s AAA credit rating (with S&P, anyway) are being felt worldwide. 7.12am: The dash for safety has sent gold racing to yet another record high – with the cost of an ounce of bullion leaping by over $50 this morning to $1,715. That’s a 3% increase. Tellingly, gold has hit a record high on 11 of the last 19 trading days, according to data from Reuters. Back in late January, an ounce was changing hands for just over $1,300. While some analysts argue that gold is a bubble ripe for popping, goldbugs insisted that the precious metal is only moving in one direction. Next stop – $2000 per ounce, argues Dominic Schnider , executive director for wealth management research at UBS. What people are realizing is that dollar and euro currencies have real problems and I think that’s manifesting in the gold price. I would say the way things evolve right now I really could even imagine $2,000 being in the cards. 6.51am: Stock markets across Asia were the first to react to the situation, and in many countries the verdict was stark. In South Korea, some trading was suspended after the main index – the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) – plunged by 7.4%. Japan’s Nikkei hit a five-month low and is down over 2% in late trading, led by banks and exporters. The losses were across-the-board: the New Zealand and Australian stock markets also slid by at least 2%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index lost 4% at one stage, with the Shanghai Composite Index down by 3.7%. 6.45am: Europe’s major stock markets open at 8am BST. IG index is calling the FTSE 100 index down 117 at 5130 – a fall of around 2.2%. Losses on other markets may be less dramatic. The German DAX is being called down 55 at 6181 and the French CAC down 34 at 3244. Here’s more from IG’s Cameron Peacock : Despite US Treasury attempts to discredit the S&P downgrade that was served up on Friday night as a bitter finish to a disastrous week for equity markets, the bears are set to attack once again as Europe’s trade gets underway. Add this to the mounting sense of panic over the eurozone debt crisis with emergency talks being held amongst finance ministers over the weekend and there’s little reason to be cheerful. As a result, Asian markets are struggling already but despite the shadow this is casting over sentiment, the fact remains that equities are now generally trading at such a discount that even if there’s more downside to come, this stage of the sell-off must soon be set to run out of steam. 6.30am: “There’s a crisis of confidence across the financial world”. That’s the message from Bloomberg TV this morning as traders arrive at City trading floors for the first time since Standard & Poor’s downgraded America’s credit rating . Investors are also gripped by the latest developments in Europe’s debt crisis. Late on Sunday night the European Central Bank pledged ‘decisive action’ to save the euro – and is expected to start buying Spanish and Italian government bonds today. Asian markets have already fallen sharply, amid fears of a new global recession. Traders are predicting that the FTSE will fall by more than one hundred points when trading begins – adding to last week’s heavy losses. We’ll bring you the latest action from the City and beyond, as the financial crisis threatens to enter a new phase. Market turmoil Financial crisis Stock markets Economics Europe European Central Bank Euro Economic policy US economy Graeme Wearden guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …We've just spent the past month or so having politicians and the press tell us that if there was no debt-ceiling deal by August 2, the government might default on its debts (of course, Tim Geithner and Barack Obama could indeed have strategically defaulted if they had wished, but work with me here). But Sunday on Meet the Press, in a remark I expect will not be relayed much if at all by the rest of the establishment press, Alan Greenspan said that default is impossible — which puts him directly at odds with the rest of Washington's elites and Ben Bernanke, his successor as Federal Reserve chairman. On July 14, Bernanke said : “A default on … (U.S. Treasury) securities would throw the financial system … potentially into chaos.” Wait until you see the reason why Greenspan says default is impossible, as carried at CNBC's web site in an item by Patrick Allen: Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan on Sunday ruled out the chance of a US default following S&P's decision to downgrade America's credit rating. “The United States can pay any debt it has because we can always print money to do that. So there is zero probability of default” said Greenspan on NBC's Meet the Press. “What I think the S&P thing did was to hit a nerve that there's something basically bad going on, and it's hit the self-esteem of the United States, the psyche” said Greenspan. Well, Alan, I don't know exactly why you said what you said, but perhaps you used the same “logic” employed by Yves Smith at the New York Times in April : The United States is simply not at risk of default. Default is impossible for a sovereign currency issuer. As I wrote at the time in reaction to Ms. Smith's contention: It must be my fertile imagination which found the following currency-issuing nations which have defaulted in past few decades: Mexico, 1982 — “In the wake of Mexico’s default, most commercial banks reduced significantly or halted new lending to Latin America.” “On August 17, 1998, the Russian government devalues the ruble, defaults on domestic debt, and declares a moratorium on payment to foreign creditors.” “Argentina defaulted on part of its external debt at the beginning of 2002.” Then there are nations which have repudiated their debts. As seen here (go to the second page of the document), “Mexico (1914), Russia (1917), China (1949), Czechoslovakia (1952), and Cuba (1960) repudiated their debts after revolutions or communist takeovers. Some countries, such as Austria (1802, 1868) and Russia (1839), defaulted after losing wars; others, such as Spain (1831) and China (1921), defaulted after enduring major civil wars.” If Greenspan, Smith et al are additionally leaning on the fact that the dollar is still the world's reserve currency, that's not a long-term given either . And just because your country wants to issue debt, that doesn't mean anyone will want to buy it. Even if investors are willing to buy a overindebted country's new bonds, it doesn't mean that they won't demand interest rates that are much higher than risk-free. Much like bankrupt persons with the delusion that they're okay because they still have unused checks in their checkbook, Alan Greenspan apparently thinks the Fed can create money out of thin air forever without dire consequences as long as the Fed's computers still have power. And here I thought he was old enough to remember the Weimar Republic . I suspect a comment such as this would have received pretty wide play by now if it had been uttered during the Bush administration after Greenspan's retirement. Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com .
Continue reading …Maddow: If We Take S&P at Their Word, the Downgrade Was Due to Republican Brinkmanship on Debt Ceiling
August 7, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media Well, we had one bright spot on the Sunday morning talks shows this weekend — the fact that Rachel Maddow was a panel member on Meet the Press. The downside, she got stuck debating Republican hack Alex Castellanos who just regurgitated one Republican lie filled talking point after another during the entire panel segment. When responding to whether his buddy Mitt Romney should have shown some leadership and weighed in on the debt ceiling debacle before it was over with or not, Castellanos tried blaming the downgrade by S&P on government spending and too much debt and Maddow corrected him about just who exactly they blamed if you actually read their report — Republicans playing chicken with the debt ceiling and their rigid refusal to ever allow taxes to be raised. MADDOW: To the extent that we are taking the S&P downgrade as a serious thing, that we believe that S&P has the credibility to have done this, and this actually does levy a blow against the U.S. economic credibility. I mean, honestly, we should talk about the fact that during the financial crisis, S&P was handing out AAA ratings to any pile of junk tall enough to reach the doorbell and ask. So they do not have the most credibility on this. But if we are going to take them seriously, let’s take them on their word about why they did this. They said they did this because of brinksmanship over the debt ceiling. They did not say they did this because there’s too much government spending. GREGORY: All right. Let’s, let… MADDOW: They said they did this because of Republicans holding the debt… CASTELLANOS: Because of the debt. MADDOW: No. The debt ceiling. Brinksmanship… CASTELLANOS: Yeah, but the debt ceiling is the ceiling… MADDOW: …is their word. Naturally Castellanos did his best to interrupt her so she couldn’t make her point. Austan Goolsbee got a chance to follow up and agree with Maddow on the fact that Republicans were the ones out there actually insane enough to be pretending that default might be acceptable. Steve Benen made some similar points in his post from today A pox on one house : But for all the complaining I do about this, it’s only fair to note when someone gets this right. National Journal ’s Edmund Andrews, for example, had a good piece yesterday that specifically rejected the notion that the downgrade is “a pox-on-both-your-houses curse at the intransigence of both Republicans and Democrats.” And who instigated this brinksmanship, refused to compromise, and delayed a resolution until literally the last day? Putting aside, at least for now, whether S&P has the credibility to make such sweeping condemnations, it’s worth emphasizing the extent to which the agency pointed the finger at congressional Republicans. It not only directly attributed blame to the GOP hostage strategy of the past few months, it lamented the very idea of allowing “the statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default” to “become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy,” before complaining that “the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues.” Andrews added, “[I]t’s hard to read the S&P analysis as anything other than a blast at Republicans.” Full transcript below the fold. GREGORY: But, but the–who’s the front-runner right now? Mitt Romney, a man you advised, who couldn’t have been farther away from what happened in Congress over this debt ceiling debate, and then at the end he says, “By the way, I’m against the deal.” Is that big leadership? CASTELLANOS: I think riding, you know, it’s like being a newspaper editor, riding out of the hills down to the battlefield after the battle’s over and shooting the wounded. I don’t think that’s particularly productive. But I think something Mr. Greenspan says is important and that is that this is not going to be without pain. There’s a reason alcohol, drugs, and promiscuous government spending are all addictive. They feel good at first. When you stop doing them, it’s going to feel less good. GREGORY: Right. CASTELLANOS: Republicans out there politically are saying, “Take the pain now. Don’t pass it on to the next generation.” That’s why they’re being so firm. GREGORY: I suspect you disagree with it, that that’s their view. MADDOW: To the extent that we are taking the S&P downgrade as a serious thing, that we believe that S&P has the credibility to have done this, and this actually does levy a blow against the U.S. economic credibility. I mean, honestly, we should talk about the fact that during the financial crisis, S&P was handing out AAA ratings to any pile of junk tall enough to reach the doorbell and ask. So they do not have the most credibility on this. But if we are going to take them seriously, let’s take them on their word about why they did this. They said they did this because of brinksmanship over the debt ceiling. They did not say they did this because there’s too much government spending. GREGORY: All right. Let’s, let… MADDOW: They said they did this because of Republicans holding the debt… CASTELLANOS: Because of the debt. MADDOW: No. The debt ceiling. Brinksmanship… CASTELLANOS: Yeah, but the debt ceiling is the ceiling… MADDOW: …is their word. GREGORY: Right. CASTELLANOS: What is the debt ceiling… GOOLSBEE: What is a rating? A rating is simply an estimate of the probability of default. GREENSPAN: That is true. GOOLSBEE: The probability of default on Treasury is zero. It’s the safest asset in the world by far. But we’ve just gone through an experience that anybody looking at it has to say, “Whoa, maybe somebody might actually default in the future,” if we were going to go to the edge of, of insanity. MGREGORY: Right. Let’s… MADDOW: That’s right. GREGORY: Let me get in here. I want to take a break.
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Statement is sharpest criticism yet directed by Saudi Arabia against Arab state since Middle East unrest began Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah has demanded an end to the bloodshed in Syria and recalled his country’s ambassador from Damascus, in a rare case of one of the Arab world’s most powerful leaders intervening against another. It was the sharpest criticism the oil giant – a monarchy who bans political opposition – has directed against any Arab state since a wave of protests roiled the Middle East and toppled autocrats in Tunisia and Egypt. “What is happening in Syria is not acceptable for Saudi Arabia,” he said in a written statement read out on Al Arabiya satellite television. Events in Syria had “nothing to do with religion, or values, or ethics”, the king said. A crackdown by Syria’s president Bashar al-Assad against protests has become one of the most violent episodes in the wave of unrest sweeping through the Arab world this year. Activists said troops with tanks had launched an assault on the city of Deir al-Zor in the east of the country, killing dozens. The past week has seen scores of people killed in a siege of Hama, a city where Assad’s father launched a crackdown nearly 30 years ago, killing thousands. Assad’s government says it is fighting against criminals and armed extremists who have provoked violence by attacking its troops. Activists and western countries say Assad’s forces have attacked peaceful protesters. “Syria should think wisely before it’s too late and issue and enact reforms that are not merely promises but actual reforms,” the Saudi king said. “Either it chooses wisdom on its own or it will be pulled down into the depths of turmoil and loss.” The Arab League, in a rare response to the escalating bloodshed in Syria, called on authorities there to stop acts of violence against civilians. Although several Arab states have joined the west in opposing Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, most of the region’s rulers have been cautious about criticising other Arab leaders during the protests. King Abdullah sent Saudi troops in March to help neighbouring monarchy Bahrain put down anti-government protests, and Saudi officials have criticised the decision to put Egypt’s ousted leader Hosni Mubarak on trial. Saudi Arabia has acted as a mediator in neighbouring Yemen, and is hosting its president Ali Abdullah Saleh, who went there for medical treatment after being wounded in a bomb attack when protests against his rule turned into open conflict. Syria Saudi Arabia King Abdullah Arab and Middle East unrest Middle East guardian.co.uk
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Despite their wildly differing politics, John Malkovich and Harold Pinter were friends. Now the film star is directing Julian Sands in a tribute to the playwright. As the Edinburgh festival launches, Stephen Moss meets them I spot John Malkovich ‘s head as soon as I enter the courtyard of the hotel, even though he is in the lounge, with his back to me and partially obscured by a blind. That cranium has an aura. He has just arrived in Edinburgh, where he is directing his long-time friend Julian Sands , the British actor, in A Celebration of Harold Pinter . It is being touted as the starriest fringe event for a decade. Sands gives me a cheery wave when I enter the lounge, and starts rearranging the furniture so the three of us can talk; Malkovich sprawls languidly in a large leather armchair. Sands, in an elegant grey suit and with a physical tautness that belies the fact he is now past 50, is fluent and to the point; Malkovich speaks slowly, and when he tells a story is strong on detail. There’s a quirky mind in that majestic bonce. A fashion designer as well as an actor and director, Malkovich is wearing a big blue jacket and jeans with huge turn-ups. Both sport grey silk scarves he designed. The origins of this Pinter celebration lie in 2005. Pinter had been due to give a reading of his poems, but throat cancer had impaired his voice and he asked Sands to step in, instructing him on how to deliver them. “After he died,” says Sands, “I repeated the recital as a memorial tribute in Los Angeles, recorded it and made some CDs for those who couldn’t be there, one of whom was John.” Sands was later approached by producer Nick Brooke to do a Pinter show at Edinburgh, followed by a national tour. Enter Malkovich. “I thought if we’re to do this, it needs to be completely re-examined,” says Sands. “I wanted more of a celebration of Harold, a convincing audio portrait. John had said to me after I’d given him the CD that I should think about working this up into a theatre piece. I’d just seen John perform in The Infernal Comedy , and his power and presence was so compelling that I thought if I was going to work with anyone on this, it has to be him. His contribution as director is more like a conductor. Yes, I
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Police deployed to deal with trouble in Enfield and Brixton, plus reports of disturbances in Dalston and Walthamstow There was mounting evidence on Sunday night that some of the second night of rioting in London was part of an orchestrated plan, as violent disturbances broke out sporadically across parts of the capital. Police in riot gear were deployed across the city to deal with trouble in Enfield, six miles north of the site of riots in Tottenham, while looters later pillaged shops in Brixton. The scenes in Enfield, while reminiscent of Saturday night’s clashes, were smaller in scale, and they took place from about 7pm. Teenagers gathered on St Andrews Road – said to have been a preplanned destination – broke down walls on terraced streets so they could collect bricks to throw at police. About a dozen shops were ransacked and a police car smashed on Church Street. Riot police moved in to secure the area and train station. Shortly after 8.30pm, a crowd of about 100 mainly teenage boys broke into a jewellery store. When police arrived less than a minute later, there were chaotic scenes, with a number of people struck with batons and attacked by dogs. Resident Mizu Rahman, 34, said a plainclothes police officer had told him at around 2pm that there was intelligence that disorder was imminent. “The officer came down the street warning us there would be trouble,” he said. “He showed me his ID. He said, ‘Do you live here?’ I said yes. He said, ‘St Andrews Road is going to be the frontline tonight’.” There was no obvious reason why the rioting should have spread to Enfield, which is in the outskirts of north London. Rahman, an engineer, said he had seen a message on Facebook that Enfield would be “next on the hitlist”. At 9.30pm, Met police and reinforcements from Kent began turning the whole of Enfield into a sterile area. Hundreds of riot police arrived with vans and police dogs, charging at groups of teenagers, who melted into sidestreets. They smashed cars and shop windows as they ran. Some teenagers knew exactly where they were heading, saying the plan was to go to Ponders End. A large crowd of youths then sprinted west, attacking a retail park and shops. Among them was a closed Tesco Extra store. Workers inside described hearing windows smashing as dozens of youths poured into the store. “They left carrying TVs, alcohol – they were stuffing trolleys,” said one supermarket worker. Unlike the previous night’s disturbances, riot police were on the scene in large numbers. Their stance was also more aggressive, with baton charges and dogs used to disperse crowds. At 11pm, on a nearby road called Elizabeth Ride, a young man was stabbed under the arm. He could walk to an ambulance but his friends refused to talk to police and disappeared, shouting: “Why would we talk to feds? You’re the reason this is happening.” Amid evidence that locals were turning against the rioters, one young woman, aged about 20, was in tears, shouting: “What are you doing? Is this how you pay your respects to Mark? Is this what he would have wanted?” The leader of Enfield council, Doug Taylor said he believed disturbances there were linked to events in Tottenham. He said: “There’s got to be a link to that extent that it’s the day after and the police are hugely well organised in Tottenham so maybe this was seen as the place to have a second night.” In Brixton, crowds attending a daytime festival were good-natured but gangs of youths ransacked shops in the area as darkness fell. Branches of Vodafone, Footlocker and H&M were all targeted by looters, who made off in scooters and cars. Police in riot gear were pushing people up Brixton High Street at around 1am. Elsewhere, there were reports of disturbances in areas including Dalston and Walthamstow. The latter area’s local Labour MP, Stella Creasy, said that branches of Argos, BHS and Barclays were all attacked, while angry locals said that looters asked them for directions to shops and banks. The Metropolitan police said on Twitter on Sunday night: “Police are responding to a significant amount of criminal activity across London and are deploying officers to tackle it.” London Crime Police Paul Lewis Matthew Taylor Ben Quinn guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things: Rep. Jason Chaffetz Dismisses Jobs Solutions With GOP Bumperstickers
August 7, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media (h/t Heather at VideoCafe ) With all the consequences of Republican destructive economic policies coming down on us this week, I knew that both the corporate media and the multitudes of GOP politicians would be spinning mightily. Not one would have the self-awareness or intellectual honesty to look at their own behaviors — focusing the debt/deficit instead of jobs, playing the false equivalency game, acting as if the economy only got bad on January 20, 2009, etc. — and acknowledge that everyone involved owns the S&P downgrade and the rotten economy that we have. On This Week , the roundtable went down predictable routes. George Will spouted his oft-repeated and still incorrect whinging that nothing the Obama adminstration has done, especially the stimulus , has worked. But relative Sunday pundit newcomer Mellody Hobson injected the fresh air of outside-the-Beltway thinking and told all these Villagers that their focus was wrong. It’s not about cutting budgets right now to improve the economy; it’s all about bringing the jobs back. And here’s where Hobson showed up these Villagers: she had some possible solutions : Yeah, so we have to put more — you know, one of the things that people don’t want to talk about is corporate incentives. Right now, no one wants to give the corporations any extra help, but there are corporate incentives out there that could move the job story. So, one, giving the corporations the ability to repatriate all this money that they have all over the world without a huge amount of taxation. If you tied it to job creation and investment spending, that would help this country. I heard a great idea from Alan Khazei, who’s running for Senate in Massachusetts, who talked about the 99ers, the people who are getting 99 weeks of unemployment insurance. Give the corporations a sponsorship for those 99ers. Tell them, we will give you a voucher for 99 weeks of compensation with the hope that you will bring these people on full time, not to mention how it affects people’s psychology that they can get up and go to work every day. Talk about affecting sentiment in this country. Wait, wait…tying tax incentives to bringing back onshore jobs? Giving 99ers a chance to get back into the workforce? That’s crazy talk. No, really. According to Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz of Utah, that’s just ridiculous: Well, we’re not just one good tax increase away from prosperity. That’s not the way that we’re going to actually grow the economy and grow jobs in this country. We in the reality-based community who value logic and sense recognize that Chaffetz entire argument is better known as Ignoratio elenchi . Did Hobson–who gave lucid and cogent suggestions of things Congress could do right now to improve the economy–actually suggest that taking steps towards getting people employed would result in instant prosperity? Of course not. But listen to Chaffetz’s suggestion: We need stability in our government. We need predictability. If you look at all the new regulations that have been — health care, the EPA, in my state of Utah, energy is a huge — in fact, that’s where the best jobs are. We don’t have an energy policy in this country. So there are lots of things we can do to grow jobs, but stability is part of it. Bumper stickers, signifying nothing. If a lack of regulation stimulates growth, where the hell was all of it during the Bush administration? As Cokie Roberts rebukes Chaffetz, if stability is needed, that ship sailed with the GOP shenanigans during the debt ceiling debate, as the S&P specifically mentioned. But this is exactly why we can’t have nice things in this country. We get bumper stickers instead of solutions and not one of the Villagers shaping dialog for the country can be honest about it.
Continue reading …Jim Jordan: Politicians Should be Careful About Shooting Their Mouths Off After He Blew Off Dangers of Defaulting on our Debt
August 7, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan apparently has his irony alert button broken after this statement he made this Thursday for the Young America’s Foundation . Responding to a question by one of the student participants, he warned that politicians had better study up on policy before they come on the air and say something stupid. This video was from Thursday, before S&P decided to downgrade our credit rating after the debacle of watching our politicians run right up to the deadline before finally agreeing to raise the cap on our debt ceiling. If Jordan thinks politicians should be studying up on policy matters before they go on the air and say something ridiculous, maybe he should be rethinking his irresponsible remarks he made on C-SPAN’s Newsmakers last month , where he acted like a partial default and running past the deadline in August would have been acceptable and would not have caused even worse problems than what we’ve seen from Standard and Poor’s over the weekend. After being asked “how you decide what the difference between risk and being naive”, Rep. Jim Jordan responded this way. JORDAN: You want to educate yourself, now what the policy is, instead of just rushing in there and being goofy and saying all kinds of crazy things, you want to take the time to make sure that you’re prepared. That’s why I try to in my comments talk about, you know, being disciplined, doing the hard work and all those things. You’ve got to do that before you, particularly in politics, before you shoot your mouth off or something like that, along those lines. So, that’s important, just to do your homework and be prepared. That’s I think a prerequisite for just about anything you’re going to try to accomplish. Later in the segment, he also said that the United States should make cuts to domestic spending before they ever dare to cut a penny out of defense, because god knows, we’ve got to have our priorities straight, don’t we? Can’t dare to put an end to that war machine we’ve got going, but poor and elderly Americans, they’re expendable. Click here to view this media I’m not sure how much worse things have to get before the voters in these wingnuts’ districts start holding them responsible. Must they destroy what’s left of our middle class in America? All I can say is they’re probably really lucky that most of their constituents don’t pay nearly the amount of attention as I do with listening to what comes out of their mouths and how they’re governing. We all know that our corporate media isn’t pointing it out for them.
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