Tag Archives: Politics

The Ides of March Film Review

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With the re-election Barack Obama next year looking increasingly unlikely, George Clooney’s fourth film as a director feels more like a bitter lament for the political hope of 2008 than a standard thriller, a noble intention of which it just falls short. It is based on a play named Farragut North by Beau Williamson that was produced at the same time as Obama’s election drive. Not one for hiding his liberal credentials, you could be forgiven for expecting that Clooney would airbrush the portrait of Democratic candidates as crusading do-gooders. Yet here, while there is focus on many topical issues blighting American society today, it is viewed through disillusioned and almost sad eyes.

Clooney appears in front of camera as well as behind it as Mike Morris, a charismatic Pennsylvanian senator and contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in a fictitious U.S. election. He is neck and neck with his party rival and with the Republicans lacking a strong contender the White House is within striking distance for both men. Fighting in Morris’ corner is his chief aide Paul Zara (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) and junior press secretary Stephen Myers (Ryan Gosling). Meyers is a young idealist who is truly inspired by Morris’s policies and determined to see him in the Oval office. Zara is the older and more jaded of the two men, the experience to Meyers’ innocence, yet together their plans of attack have Morris on a seemingly unstoppable course.

Meyers’ is then approached by Tom Duffy (Paul Giamatti), Zara’s opposite in the enemy camp who is determined to have Meyers work for him and promises to reveal the secrets behind Morris’ glowing reputation. What then follows is a descent into moral confusion, corruption and betrayal as Meyers’ attempts to keep his head above water and survive in a world of cut throat political ambition.

From its opening dissection of the inner workings of a televised candidate debate, it is clear the The Ides Of March is concerned with what lies underneath the tarp of 21st century politics. If Senator Morris is the general of an army then Meyers and his colleagues are the soldiers down in the dirt fighting hand to hand for victory. Clooney confidently cuts back and forth between debates and television interviews with scenes of aides and interns working tirelessly away behind the scenes with laptops, cell phones and cups of coffee rarely out of reach. In certain scenes he places television sets within the frame of the more intimate moments of drama creating a seemingly inescapable world where everyone’s careers (i.e. lives) are out on the line. It’s very well made indeed with Clooney keeping most of the showy direction to a minimum with one or two notable yet well done exceptions. The merciless vibrating of a mobile phone with all other sound drowned out is a particularly effective moment.

It would also appear as though Clooney’s experience as an actor has left him with the strong ability to get strong performances from his ensemble. Along with Drive and to a lesser extent Crazy, Stupid, Love, Ryan Gosling deserves firm establishment as an A-Lister star. Blessed with astonishingly handsome looks, Gosling delivers on the idea of a youthful idealist steadily crushed under the pressure of back-stabbing and corruption. Meyers is a man desperate to do right for the cause he believes in yet his selfless and single minded vision ultimately blinds him and he becomes everything he has detested in the older characters at the stories outset. It’s an old idea that Gosling manages to make alive through his sheer charisma and penetrating gaze summed up perfectly in the films elegant and haunting final shot. On the seasoned front, Hoffman and Giamatti get to relish in weighty, meaty dialogue set pieces that tie in with the movies theatrical background and could be dismissed as sheer awards season bait were they not so well done. Hoffman hints at years of pent up paranoia and resentment in a powerful monologue about his need for loyalty where Giamatti rallies against the Democratic lack of ruthlessness on the playing field (‘We need to get down in the mud with the donkeys!’) It’s a scene that speaks for the whole movie, with the Republicans given no time on screen and only alluded to it is left to the one side to fight each other and it is given riveting conviction by two character actors at the top of their game.

Unfortunately it is Clooney’s handling of another key character that is the films major downfall. With masculinity running rife through the major plot lines, Evan Rachel Wood has to work very hard to make her character of a confident yet out of her depth intern a voice to be heard. She does a good job with what she’s given; her early scenes with Gosling have an undeniably sexy and arresting charge to them. Yet she is then underhanded by a plot revelation feels so trite and forced that it threatens to capsize the proceedings. Clooney clearly needs a shattering plot device to mark Meyers’ turning point yet it is so out of place and stands out that he feels terribly fumbled. I can’t possibly spoil it yet it’s impossible to miss and reduces Wood to a bland and unconvincing cipher rather than a rounded out character.
Ultimately The Ides Of March feels as though it aspires to something revelatory and worthy yet it can’t help but fall back onto some very typical thriller tropes that hold it back from something more special. It’s a shame really as Clooney elicits some really cracking performances and attempts to take a far more scathing and world weary view of the American political spectrum. If you’re looking for something more substantial then I strongly recommend you revisit Clooney’s Good Night and Good Luck, still his best film by far. This is still fine work and worth watching but you can’t escape the feeling of close but no cigar.

Daily Mail Accused of 'Intimidating' Hugh Grant After Leveson Testimony

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The Leveson Inquiry has been warned that actor and activist Hugh Grant has been “punished” for his decision to speak out about press intrusion on Monday.

Associated Newspapers – publisher of the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday- hit out at Grant’s allegation that his phone had been hacked by the Mail on Sunday by claiming that he had lied under oath.

“Mr Grant’s allegations are mendacious smears driven by his hatred of the media,” the publisher said in a statement that also said that it “utterly refutes” Grant’s claims.

Barristers representing the Metropolitan Police and numerous hacking victims have said that the actor’s treatment after giving evidence would probably be “intimidating” to other witnesses.

The Daily Mail also “unequivocally denies” the paying of a hospital source to secure information about the birth of his first child.

Robert Sherborne, the legal counsel representing the hacking victims said the newspaper was using its power to bully the star.

“What was filed in the pages of the Daily Mail and the website was not a denial but a personal attack on Mr Grant as a witness…what they suggested is that he was deliberately lying.”

“There is a difference between a right of reply and a right of attack – if those you have been brave enough to come and give evidence receive this kind of treatment then witnesses will be unwilling to be that brave any longer,” Sherborne added.

Metropolitan Police QC Neil Garman was also concerned that Grant’s treatment could affect other witnesses

“Witnesses will be very cautious, we fear, if the likelihood is that they will face that kind of treatment the day after.

Other high profile witnesses who are expected to give evidence are Steve Coogan, Sienna Miller [one of the first people to sue News Corporation] and JK Rowling.

Jonathan Caplan QC, representing Associated Newspapers, said that the newspapers had made the statement “under pressure” in response to serious allegations of serious criminal misconduct, which it denied.

When asked about the attack on Grant, Caplan told Lord Justice Leveson:”I accept everything you say.”

Grant told the hearing he had tried to keep his ex-girlfriend Tinglan Hong’s pregnancy secret after the News of the World first speculated that she may be carrying his baby in April. Grant said: “my overwhelming motive throughout this whole episode was to protect the mother of my child”.

Grant said that Hong had been followed by paparazzi but the papers “seem not to have anything to print that could link her to me until I visited the hospital after the birth when again there seems to have been a leak from the hospital”

Grant said that he received a phone call the next day from the Daily Mail, and then the Daily Star. He said that he refused to comment, believing that to do so would give the paper confidence to publish.

He said that the Mail had adopted a “fishing technique and they didn’t want to print the story based solely on the hospital source because that might have been unethical or possibly illegal so they needed a comment from my side and that is why I said nothing”.

The Mail did not publish the item. The news was then published by US Weekly last month. The actor said the baby was the product of a “fleeting affair” and that Hong was “besieged” by photographers after the news was published and the actor was forced to take out an injunction to force them to go away.

When questioned by Robert Jay, QC to the Leveson inquiry, Grant said the only people who knew about he child were a female cousin, and Hong’s Chinese parents, “who spoke no English”.

The Mail issued a statement saying it “unequivocally denies Hugh Grant’s allegation that it secured information about the birth of his child from a source at the hospital” which instead came from “a source in his showbusiness circle more than two weeks after the birth”.

Grant said that he was sure the Mail had hacked his phone and referred to a report in the Mail on Sunday in February 2007, which said his relationship with his then girlfriend, Jemima Khan, was “on the rocks” because of “persistent late-night phone calls with a plummy-voiced executive from Warner Brothers” – a story he said was “completely untrue”. Jemima Khan also denied the story via her Twitter account.

Lord Justice Leveson also heard evidence from the parents of Milly Dowler, the murdered schoolgirl whose phone was appallingly hacked by the News of the World.

Bob and Sally Dowler spoke publicly for the first time about the moment they believed their daughter was picking up her voicemail messages, giving false hope that she was still alive.

Sally Dowler’s told the inquiry that after a period in which every time she rang her missing daughter’s mobile phone, it said the mailbox was full. She said: “It clicked through on to her voicemail so I heard her voice and [said]: ‘She’s picked up her voicemail Bob, she’s alive’.”

The couple also told the court that a private walk they took seven weeks after their daughter’s disappearance was pictured prominently in the News of the World. They claimed photographers were tipped off about the walk after the paper hacked their mobile phones.

Bob Dowler said: “The thing to remember is the walk was nothing to do with Milly’s phone.” His wife added: “That was our own home phone or own mobile phones.”

News International has paid £2m in compensation to the Dowler family, and the company said it had nothing further to add following their testimony.

David Cameron Sacks Green Envoy Zac Goldsmith in 'Petty and Vindictive' Move.

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It is rare to meet a politician with integrity, who keeps their word, and it seems Zac Goldsmith has paid the price for keeping to his.

Prime Minister David Cameron has been accused of being ‘petty and vindictive’ after the Tory MP for Richmond Park had a key Government job taken away from him after he defied him over the EU.

Goldsmith had previously been appointed by the Prime Minister as his personal Downing Street envoy in a bid to fight global warming. The offer was withdrawn a mere two days before Goldsmith’s first assignment, and a matter of hours after he voted in favour of a referendum on the EU.

Goldsmith was due to start work as the Prime Ministers ‘climate change and forest envoy’ last month. His first task was to meet with President Ali Bongo Ondimba of Gabon, where forests are at risk. The meeting that was to be held in London last month was publicly announced. Goldsmith was then barred from attending and the job offer was revoked.

The Richmond Park MP said last night: ‘I was always going to vote for the referendum motion, not least because I promised my constituents I would.

‘But the Government was very unwise to impose a three-line whip on Conservative MPs. It created  all sorts of problems for itself that could have been avoided.’

Goldsmith refused to comment on the job offer being revoked, but said: ‘Reversing the decline of forestry worldwide is one of the most important battles faced by our species.
‘I don’t need a formal government role to pursue that work.’

Two days earlier, he was among 81 Tory MPs who voted in favour of a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU and ignored Mr Cameron’s order to toe the line.

A Government source had this to say: ‘You cannot have someone rebelling against the Government one day and walking into a government job the next. Not when two ministerial aides resigned over the EU vote. But Zac is a great guy  and we hope we can revive this job offer in time.’

A fellow MP disagreed and told the Daily Mail: ‘It was petty and vindictive to cancel this post. Zac had every right to vote in favour of a referendum on Europe.

‘The Government constantly says it is giving top priority to efforts  to curb climate change and yet it is prepared to risk that to punish an MP for sticking to his principles on the EU. It is the kind of thing that brings politics into disrepute.’

Well-placed government sources said Goldsmith had spent months in talks with Government officials about the climate change and forest envoy role.

International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell, Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne and Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman had all given the go-ahead for his appointment

Read Frost’s interview with Zac Goldsmith

Rebekah Brooks Expecting First Child

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Former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks is expecting her first child with racehorse trainer husband Charlie.

The couple are having the child through a surrogate. They are the biological parents and it will be born in February 2012.

Brooks’s spokesperson David Wilson said in a statement released on November the 17th: “Charlie and Rebekah are overjoyed. While the pregnancy has not been without its difficulties and sadness, Charlie and Rebekah are obviously hoping for a very happy ending to almost five years of trying to conceive themselves.

“Both parents are acutely aware of the infertility problems encountered by many other couples, and in the longer term hope to recognise their own good fortune by working in some way to help others facing similar challenges.”

The couple are having a girl, who was originally one of twins, but one of the twins died earlier in the pregnancy.

The surrogate mother wishes to remain anonymous.

UK Youth Unemployment Hits a Million – A Fundamental Not A Short Term Problem

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UK youth unemployment rose above 1 million, its highest level since 1996 according to government figures. Employment Minister Chris Grayling blamed the Eurozone debt crisis for the rising number of jobless. Looking at the table below we can see that youth unemployment in this country has been rising for many years even before the recession.

May-July 2004 580,000 12.2
May-July 2005 600,000 12.6
May-July 2006 706,000 14.5
May-July 2007 711,000 14.6
May-July 2008 727,000 14.8
May-July 2009 944,000 19.8
May-July 2010 921,000 19.4
May-July 2011 973,000 20.8
July-September 2011 1,020,000 21.9

Source: Office of National Statistics

Typically and not unexpectedly the politicians have sought to push blame and responsibility elsewhere. The coalition blame everything on the Eurozone, Labour just want to capitalise on the situation and refuse to take any responsibility for a problem which they largely created. They still claim they did a brilliant job with the education system.

This isn’t a cyclical problem. It’s not about getting the economy to grow (as we keep hearing) it’s about the fundamental failure of our education system to prepare young people for work. The statistics above don’t lie. The problem is an obsession with grades and targets when we should be obsessed with skills. See my earlier article here. The previous Labour government became pushed as many students as it could into universities and it shunned apprenticeships. I myself have first-hand experience of the system I came out of school and university with top grades but totally unprepared for work.

Almost 28% of UK graduates who left university in 2007 were still not in full-time work three and a half years later, figures have suggested.

But if you think it’s bad here and can’t get any worse think again. Youth unemployment in Spain is at an astonishing 46.2% and youth unemployment across Europe has soared. This has been going on for much longer than the Eurozone crisis.

The exception to the rule is Germany. Please politicians look at the German system. The German system is defined by flexibility. It is designed to suit the individual Germany has five different types of secondary school. The German education system is geared to getting people into work. It has an incredibly successful apprenticeship system which allows young people to gain valuable experience and skills. (p.s. It has little or no tuition fees as well) The coalition government has made some progress in regard to apprenticeships but it is not nearly enough. Our entire curriculum, system and culture needs to be completely revised.

I am writing this article not to complain or blame the government but to make people aware of this serious fundamental problem. Make no mistake if we don’t fix this we are heading for a crisis. It will not be fixed overnight. We need a radical overhaul of our education system, if we continue down this path we are heading for disaster. The coalition government thinks it has done enough, it has not.

 

James Murdoch Was 'Never Shown “For Neville” Email' Hacking Inquiry.

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James Murdoch is in front of the Commons Committee again today. He is holding himself well and was ‘offended’ when MP Tom Watson compared News International to the mafia, Watson claimed that Mr Murdoch was the only mafia head who did not know he was running a mafia. To which Murdoch said the comment was ‘rude and inappropriate, [to the chairman] Chairman, please’.

James Murdoch claimed knowledge of the ‘For Neville’ email, but claims it was not shown to him.

He then went on to blame Colin Myler and Tom Crone for ‘misleading MPs’ at the Culture, Media and Sport Committee in testimony they gave about whether he was made aware of the extent of phone hacking at the paper.

Mr Murdoch said of the meeting with Mr Myler and Mr Crone that it had been to discuss increasing an offer to settle a legal claim by the chief executive of the Professional Footballers’ Association, Gordon Taylor.

“The meeting, which I remember quite well, was a short meeting, and I was given at that meeting sufficient information to authorise the increase of the settlement offers that had been made,” he said. “But I was given no more than that.”

“That second part, that importance, was not described to me in detail or at all,” Mr Murdoch said. “It was not described as the For Neville email, and I want to be very clear. No documents were shown to me at that meeting or were given to me at that meeting.”

Mr Murdoch said he could not recall discussing the Gordon Taylor case with Mr Myler before June 10 2008. “The first and only substantive meeting or conversation that I recall about the matter was the June 10 meeting with Mr Crone and Mr Myler, although I cannot rule out whether or not he called me or stopped me in the hallway, or something like that, for a brief conversation,”

“Yeah, I know what I said but… come on, play fair Infidel!”

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Carlos the Jackal, the notorious terrorist and assassin of the latter part of the last century hasn’t got a nail clipper and he’s peeved. It’s mainly because he’s doing a lot of press and he wants to be presentable, after all, it’s a basic human right to have as much chance of meeting Louis Theroux as anyone else, right?

It always amazed me when people who have taken an oath to destroy an entire society or bring down a government that represents, to them, pure evil and then when they get caught, or their rucksack fails to reap the souls of the infidels around them because it got wet waiting for the train at Luton and now it’s just got cake mix oozing through its webbing, they seem more than happy to bend the principles they killed for if it means a few quid or a comfy cell.

It’s as if they’re saying, “I want to destroy your way of life because it represents all that is wrong with the world… but until I do, can I get a skinny latte and do you have WiFi?”

Osama Bin Laden, erstwhile leader of a terrorist cell that holds the most anti-western viewpoint of them all wasn’t averse to a nice pair of trainers and a designer watch. That video of him rocking back and forth in front of the telly looked more like he was waiting for the Lotto program to skip past the crappy thunderball and get to the main event. You could almost read, “it’s a roll over this week,” in his body language- and while we’re at it, I suspect that he didn’t just go for the ‘Al Jazeera’ channel when it was being installed either. Those long nights in a cave can just fly by if you’ve got Babestation and The Simpsons to keep you going.
It just feels like, if you’re going to take the moral high ground to such an extreme, you should be willing to die by the same sword you came running in screaming with.

Suicide bombers, for example. You don’t get more committed than that. Delusional sheep, bereft of even the most basic common sense they may be, but commitment they do very well. You’d think, therefore, that if their planned trip to everlasting back-patting and more virgins than a ‘World of Warcraft’ convention ended up as six months in an orange boiler suit in Southern Cuba, they’d laugh in the face of such conditions with the kind of scorn only someone who has tried to do to themselves what their captors will always stop short of doing, can pull off. It’s a shame we can’t take some of those that survive and retrain them as call center workers or marriage councilors. A little conversion and they could get employee of the month at The Samaritans on a two day week.

But no. Instead they’re hiring lawyers and complaining that their human rights have been violated. Abu Hamza, the low rent Dr. Evil who hates all non-Muslims and has devoted his life to trying to bring down civilization and turn the world into a Muslim state, screamed like Louis Spence on a ghost train the minute he thought he could lose his council flat and benefits and even appealed against losing his British Citizenship.

So, to any terrorists out there let me just say this: Play fair. I know you hate me, and it’s fair to say I hate you, but come on. Do it properly or not at all. We’ll give you your human rights if we have to because that’s what we do- we’re the human rights people, you’re not. Having them thrust upon you should feel, to you, like a vegan protestor, marching for PETA against vivisection, being given a fur coat and a bucket of KFC so they don’t catch a chill. You should eschew such western ways with a hate-filled ‘harrumph!’ And maybe a gob full of something nasty in the face of your jailer. Screaming that you’ve missed ‘strictly’ and only had four of your five a day just makes you look like the jihad equivalent of Johnny Rotten. One minute he’s sticking pins in the establishment and swearing on TV, the next he’s that property developer off ‘I’m a celebrity’ who advertises butter.

Bitter US Cuts UNESCO Funding After YES Vote for Palestinian Seat

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The United States is cancelling all funding for the UN Cultural body, UNESCO, after they granted full membership to the Palestinians. The vote was greeted by cheers and celebrations. 107 countries voted in favour, and just 14 voted against. This is just the first of many UN agencies the Palestinians wish to join.

The vote will be seen as heavy defeat for the US which had been lobbying heavily against Palestinian membership. The vote emphasises the increasing impotence of the West, as the balance of power shifts. Whilst the US, Canada, Germany and of course Israel voted against (the UK abstained), emerging countries such as China, Russia, India, Brazil, South Africa as well as many Arab states voted in favour.

But the US still has serious power to weld and its reaction will be immediate. A $60 million due next month will now be withheld along with all future payments. A strict law passed in the 1990s bars the US giving funding to any UN body that admits the Palestinians as full members before a peace deal is reached. The US now fears becoming increasingly isolated.

A vote is expected in November at the UN Security Council on granting full membership of the UN to the Palestinians.