Category Archives: Culture

Sibling Rivalry {Carl Packman}

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On Newsnight with Jeremy Paxman yesterday David Miliband, Labour leadership contender, former foreign secretary and the apple of Hilary Clinton’s eye, slipped a little under the scrutiny, a rare occurrence for him. Paxman wasn’t particularly cutting, simply asked Miliband whether he thought his brother Ed, also running for leader of the former incumbent party, would do a good job of it. “I don’t want to say anything negative here Jeremy,” Miliband the elder uttered, to which Paxman rightly replied “I’m not asking you to”.
Where might this compulsion to state negatives have possibly come from?
Sibling rivalry has always been characterised as a means of grabbing the most parental resources as possible away from the other, to secure your monopoly over the paedocratic (as in paedocracy, regime led by children) kingdom of a Mother’s affection, and it can rear its competitive head in many ways.
One unnamed crackers genetic determinist put it:
Parental resources are finite, and if one brother gets a large proportion of parental time, attention, and money, then this necessarily means that the other brother will be getting less.
Stereotypes abound, the job of competing for the affection of the Miliband boys’ Father, the Marxist intellectual Ralph Miliband, author of books such as The State in Capitalist Society, would surely have been met with disdain, particularly with regards to Father Miliband’s political commitment to egalitarianism and equal distribution – the sibling rivalry of the brother’s surely would’ve been seen as nothing short of capitalist doctrine consuming their innocent souls like cows branded for ownership proof.
Other sibling rivals like Christopher and Peter Hitchens do battle with ideas – the former once being famous for his firebrand left wing politics, now shoved to one side for the pursuit of a militant atheism and insistence on the benefits of the Iraq war, while the latter brother sits himself on the right wing politically, born again in his Christianity and fully opposed to military intervention in the Middle East.
David and Ed play the nice game, but the elder brother’s small, but telling, admission with Paxman puts another thorn in the side of those who feel that sibling rivalry is just a load of ol’ poppy.
For those of us who have any optimism for the Labour party, that it should bin its recent past with dignity, doing away with those things to which parallels can be drawn with Shakespeare’s As You Like It – “All the world’s a stage” when it comes to our neo-imperialist adventures, or “too much of a good thing” with the thirteen years of New Labour flirtation with the neo-liberal vacuum – ought to be careful what we wish for the future; might the brother’s Miliband be playing the parts of rival siblings Orlando and Oliver, where jealously prevails over a divisive inheritance?

by Carl Packman

You can read more of Carl’s thoughts and articles on his blog Raincoat Optimism.

New York City Timelapse Tilt-Shift Video {Misc-uity}

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Tilt-shift photography is a style of photography in which the camera is manipulated so that a life-sized location or subject looks like a miniature-scale model. This video ‘The Sandpit’ made by Sam O’Hare is a combination of tilt-shift photography and timelapse. It’s made up of thousands of still photographs, he captures NYC and shrinks it to the size of a model village.

The Sandpit from Sam O’Hare on Vimeo.

To achieve this miniature effect to your photographs, it’s best to shoot subjects from a high angle (especially from the air). It creates the illusion of looking down at a miniature model. A camera equipped with a tilt-shift lens, which simulates a shallow depth of field, is essentially all you need to start. Or you could cheat and do it in post.

Is it Bromance; Carl on the Coalition {Politics}

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Since the first press release by Nick Clegg and David Cameron on Wednesday, it has dawned on the media that any coalition conflict in the near future is unlikely to come from these guys, and their so-called ‘love-in‘.

Tweedledum and Tweedledee; Ant and Dec; these are just some of the names to appear on the blogosphere or from the tweets of the twitterati to refer to our Prime Minister and the deputy. The BBC and ITN have taken to showing constant replays of David Cameron calling on Clegg to ‘come back‘ during one of their jokes in the back garden of number 10, and Henry McLeish, Labour’s former first minister in Scotland, even accidentally uttered the name “David Clegg”.

If you think Clegg will be Cameron’s nagging Aunty you can think again.

However that is not to say there will be no conflict within the coalition. On the same day as the press release Vince Cable was awaiting confirmation of the equal patch he will have with George Osborne as chair of the committee in charge of banks, only to find that those were not the plans at all.

Osborne’s sources were quick to brush the incident off by saying there had been some confusion on the matter, but it is clear for anyone to see why Ozzy Osborne wants his fingers on the banks, and not to share with his new pal Cable.

In spite of the fact that Osborne in the past has waxed lyrical about getting tough on the banks, and that the Libservatives have drawn up and agreed on a pledge to curb earth shattering bank bonuses, giving Cable the back seat is indicative that our new Chancellor finds dubious some of Cable’s tough plans for banks, namely the separation of high street and investment banking, and his no nonsense measures for banks’ lending requirements.

Sean O’ Grady of the Independent suspects that the honeymoon period inside the cabinet will be over by the 25th of June – the date of the emergency budget setting out a frame for public finances – when key differences in the party will come to the fore.

Cable has already agreed to back down on his plans for a mansion tax on properties worth over 2m, which would’ve saved money for those on the lower end of the tax scale, and Osborne compromised on raising inheritance tax exemption to 1m. Of those two compromises it is not difficult to see which measure could be for the purpose of softening the blow for the poorest in times of austerity, and which measure is in-built ideology.

If you want to identify where that coalition split will be, don’t look at Clegg and Cameron, who have to wear different coloured ties so we can tell them apart, it’s the economy, stupid.

by Carl Packman

You can read more of Carl’s thoughts and articles on his blog Raincoat Optimism.

Carole Stone on how she made The Stone Club a success.

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People who meet me now find it hard to believe that as a teenager I was very shy. I remember that in my first job at the BBC as a secretary I used to loiter outside the newsroom waiting for someone else to go in so that I could slip in behind them, unnoticed. Today I must seem very confident, not to say loud, and I’m happy to speak in public to different audiences. But it’s taken quite a bit of effort to get there, for if I was shy when I was young, my brother Roger was even shyer – pathologically so. To try to get him to communicate at all with other people I just had to make contact with them myself. I think that’s where my interest in other people began and why today I can’t pass up a chance to put people together who I think might benefit in all sorts of ways from getting to know each other. At the last count I have over 40,000 people on my database and two books to my name on what I call the art of networking.

I first got a chance to bring very different people together in a big way when I became the Producer of BBC Radio 4’s Any Questions?, every week trying to get the right mix of politicians, business people, and leading figures from the arts and sciences and the media to make an interesting programme. And when I left the BBC I started a business along the same lines, putting together people who wanted to meet but might not have done so without a helping hand.

Recently I have been working as managing director of YouGovStone, a joint venture company which I set up with the online opinion polling organisation YouGov. I have a panel of about four thousand people which I consult on behalf of clients who want to know what opinion leaders – what I call the ‘Influentials’ – are thinking on a host of different topics.

And then in May 2009 I did something I have wanted to do for ages, I opened a club – TheStoneClub. We don’t have a permanent home: instead, members meet for different events in one of several venues in central London. My motto for this virtual club is ‘A Meeting of Minds’, and I have two tiers of membership. Silver members come to what I call my ‘In Conversation’ evenings, to listen to and question speakers like Lord (Brian) Griffiths of Goldman Sachs, Jeremy Hunt, MP, the Tory shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, and Tom Bower, author of devastating blockbuster biographies about people like Richard Branson, Robert Maxwell, and Harrods owner Mohamed al-Fayed. Future guest speakers I’ve booked for these events include the Doug Richard, formerly of Dragon’s Den and entrepreneur.

Gold members tend to be more business-oriented, and for them, in addition to my ‘In Conversation’ events, I arrange breakfasts with speakers like Vicky Pryce, the Director-General, Economics, at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and Adrian Monck, Managing Director, Communications, at Davos, the World Economic Forum. I’m much looking forward to welcoming Sly Bailey, the Chief Executive of Trinity Mirror, the UK’s largest newspaper publisher, to a breakfast soon.

Running a business that is all about people is really demanding, and of course there are times when I’m cross with myself for not having looked after one of my think tank or club members as well as I think should. But I’ll never give up trying, because to me people are a solace, the real joy of life.

The Stone Club is a fantastic private members club. For more info or to join, follow this link: http://www.yougovstone.com/content/the-stone-club.asp

BBC to project real time results onto 'Big Ben'

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I say Big Ben, what I mean is St Stephen’s tower.
The BBC are projecting an unbranded bar chart of the results as they come in and it “will feature a “winning line”, representing the 326 seats that any party will need to win to be sure of an outright victory”
It’ll provide a count of the number of seats won by the main three parties as well as those won by smaller parties and independent candidates.
It’ll be up until around 0530am on the 7th.

Here’s more info on the BBC site.

The Great Political Debate: Part 3: Conservative – Why You Would be Mad to Vote For Labour and Why I’m a Conservative

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By James Yardley

A response to Alain Lewis

Thanks for the article as a Conservative supporter voting for the first time it’s really interesting to know how supporters of other parties think. I guess I feel a bit like you did in 1987 and 1992 at the moment. I wonder how people can still vote for Labour after the last 13 years. However reading your article helped me understand a bit better.

You are right there are some good things Labour has done, giving the bank of England independence, introducing the minimum wage and investing more heavily in health and education but this was all introduced when Labour first came to power. Everything since has been a complete disaster and I can’t believe anyone would vote for them with the record they have.

The Wars – Lies for going to war in Iraq (Al Qaeda justification, WMD), trying to fight two wars on a peace time budget, a lack of proper equipment and vehicles leading to greater casualties than there should have been. No planning for after the war.

NHS computers systems – A waste of £12 billion which makes peoples job harder

Schools – Only teach the test, standards are no better exams have got easier, teachers have no power, schools are run as democracies.

ID cards and a massive national database – A waste of billions with absolutely no purpose other than to centralise power and exert greater control over the individual, quite frankly dangerous and bad for our democracy

Needing a licence to protest and building millions of CCTV cameras, Arresting people for shouting out the names of the dead outside number 10 – Fascist, dangerous and undemocratic

Brown and Mandelson unelected – It’s a disgrace that Gordon Brown thinks he has the right to govern having not been elected by either the British people or his own party. Even worse is that Mandelson, twice embroiled in major corruption scandals, also unelected is somehow the second most powerful man in the country. Are we living in a democracy? Are people really just going to accept this?

Spin The whole 13years have been characterised by image, deception and spin. Every attempt has been made to hide the real truth.

Numerous broken manifesto promises – Completely unforgivable broken promises about tuition fees and a referendum on the Lisbon treaty. There are tens of others as well some though not all of which can be attributed to the financial crisis.

Economy – The Golden rules proved to be more spin and were broken at the first test, borrowing and spending far more than was affordable. In 1997 the deficit was 6 billion, today it is 160 and the national debt has doubled.

Policing – The police waste hours filling out endless paper work. As a result you never see them on the street.

Reforming benefits – Millions of people on incapacity benefits who shouldn’t be

What is worst and most shocking of all is that Labour has completely abandoned the very people it is supposed to represent. The gap between the wealthiest and the poorest has grown considerably. There is less social mobility than ever before. Labour has done nothing to break the cycle. Those who most need help getting into work have not been helped effectively. The 10p tax initiative summed up the whole situation. This is why I respect Richard Wright who wrote the first article because although I disagree with his politics he won’t settle for the Labour party as it is today.

Alain argues that David Cameron is trying to force private schools into the state sector. But that’s not David Cameron that’s a Labour policy. The government academy scheme (which Cameron does support and wants to expand). That says it all. The Labour party is not representative of its supporters but because they won’t vote for anyone else and Labour knows they can get away with it.

How can anyone vote for this party when they so clearly have no morality or integrity whatsoever? It is blatantly obvious that the Labour party cares only about itself. It will always put themselves first before the interests of the country. This is where our politics has gone so wrong. It’s time to start putting the people first again.

I’m a Conservative because I believe in giving power to the individual. Letting people live their own lives but still supporting them when they need help. We need to devolve power to a local level, allowing local communities to make their own decisions instead of some bureaucrat in Whitehall. That’s why I’m supporting David Cameron’s big society.

The Labour party has always sought to expand the power of the state. Every decision is controlled from the centre. They’ve tried to bring in ID cards and national databases. Everyone is treated as a statistic. This is not only inefficient and wasteful but it is also dangerous. An overly powerful state is bad for our democracy. The state has a role but it should be there to support you not to tell you how to live your life.

Budgets have seen huge increases, that’s a good thing, but only a small proportion has made it onto the frontline. In the last 13 years the government has created huge numbers of managers and administrators. It has become overly obsessed with its endless targets. This obsession is profoundly damaging. For example school exam results may be improving but does anyone really believe students are more intelligent or skilled. The real test is in the number of people being employed and youth unemployment is at around an astonishing 20%. That’s the only real statistic which matters in my eyes.

Conservatism is also about enterprise. Encouraging everyone to achieve their goals. Taxing people less. Helping small businesses by making it easier to employ people and cutting the ridiculous amounts of red tape that exist at the moment.

It’s time to get rid of this tired, inefficient and dishonest government. It’s time for people to take power back in to their own hands. That’s why I will be voting Conservative.

James Yardley

Alternative Election Night {TV Preview}

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It’s only a couple of days until Britain goes to the polls for the closest general election in a generation. On Thursday night, the BBC will begin an epic 20-hour broadcast from it’s huge studio set, ITV will have Alistair Stewart and Julie Etchingham surrounded by virtual reality graphics and Sky will have it’s presenters at constituencies across the country. Meanwhile, Channel Four will be taking an entirely different approach to election night.

Lauren Laverne, David Mitchell and Jimmy Carr will present a four-hour special, taking an entertaining and provocative look at the results as they come in. They’ll be joined by Charlie Brooker who’ll provide typically acerbic and hilarious comment, an array of guests including a bookmaker with the latest odds and a live studio audience. Viewers at home will also be able to join in on Twitter as night unfolds by sending tweets to @c4altelection and using the hashtag #C4altelection.

As well as the live broadcast from the studio, there’ll be pre-recorded segments using some of the channel’s most popular programmes. Throughout the night there’ll be segments from a special edition of Come Dine With Me featuring the unlikely combination of Edwina Currie, Brian Paddick, Derek Hatton and Rod Liddle. At ten o’clock, just after the exit polls come in, Charlie Brooker is joined by Robert Webb, Sharon Horgan and Peter Serafinowicz for a special edition of You Have Been Watching, looking at election coverage and the world of political television. Plus, from time to time the Fonejacker’s cast of characters will be popping up with prank calls.

The last time an alternative, satirical election broadcast was attempted, it was the utterly fantastic Election Night Armistice in 1997, where Armando Iannucci, Peter Baynham and David Schneider introduced Alan Partridge with the latest results from Norwich, a “prostitute in a helicopter” ready to land wherever the first result is declared to try to produce the first scandal of the new parliament, and a male voice choir performing popular news theme tunes. It’s hard to imagine that Channel Four’s effort will be able to come close to Iannucci’s genius, but with David Mitchell and Charlie Brooker on board, it should be definitely worth watching.

The Alternative Election Night on Thursday 6 May, 9pm on Channel Four.