Category: Leadership

How Immigration has helped Germany

On By Nicholas AlexanderIn Leadership, SyriaLeave a comment

In 2015 Germany opened its borders to a million refugees. Angela Merkel suffered criticism from the Right who disagreed.

By 2017, there was a prevalent view that Wir schaffen das would be Merkel’s undoing, a “catastrophic mistake” as Donald Trump said in January that year. “The worst decision a European leader has made in modern times,” Nigel Farage told Fox News. “She’s finished.”

That quote from this article, illustrates the criticism of her policy, Wir schaffen das – which means “We will manage” but she has been proven right. A million refugees are now settling and starting companies, not all, but some. There have been no terrorist attacks in three years.

Merkel has advanced the German economy and her approval rating has returned to where it was before it took a hit from reaction to this policy. Germany becomes a beacon of hope for world peace, as settlement of refugees is a large part of bringing peace.

The other side of that coin is the defeat of authoritarian regimes, the most serious one is in Syria. The Government has been at war with a number of factions, including ISIS, not all aligned with ISIS. It has used chemical weapons and that civil war has destroyed many of Syria’s cities. It has produced many refugees and Germany took many.

It is instructive to the nationalistic shutting off that infect the UK and the USA. Rampant nationalism is the cousin of racism.

Stupid People

On By Nicholas AlexanderIn Leadership, UK, UK PoliticsLeave a comment

“Stupid People” muttered Jeremy Corbyn. The Stupid People in the ranks of the Conservative Government rounded on him claimed he muttered “Stupid woman” directed at the Prime Minister Theresa May. You can read his lips, he said “Stupid People”. Yet many very convinced Right Wing believers were adamant that he said something he did not apologise for, that he pointed out that he would also have objected to, he is not a misogynist, and he said “Stupid People”. It was a moment of political clarity.

And the media frenzy was about the question of what he said rather than why he said it. Shortly after this indicative event, Gatwick Airport was closed down due to the use of drones allegedly. How were these two events related?

This Tory Government has been so focused on their core policy of austerity, and implementing an invalid referendum to break the UK away from the EU. Their negotiations have been lamentably awful. The Prime Minister took charge of the negotiations and got a deal with the EU, but will not let Parliament vote on it because it will lose. Now she is using the threat of reaching no-deal and causing economic and political collapse as a lever to ensure her deal gets approved. Under the conditions of austerity, the UK has seen a terrible catastrophe when Grenfell Tower caught fire and due to ridiculous regulations the building was clad unsafely, and 72 people died. There were no sprinklers, there was one fire exit and the fire brigade could not control the blaze. Under conditions of austerity, the Crossrail project has gone ahead, the largest most significant project but it has overrun its completion date by a year and several billion pounds. Under austerity, local councils have been decimated and local services have suffered. Under the guidance of the Transport Minister, a smug and awful Chris Grayling, there has been chaos on the railways, including strikes and an timetable train that was not planned correctly, causing billions wasted in business. Under this Government, retail has gone to the wall. There is simply no actual intelligence in the Government’s planning. China, in the meantime, has a thriving economy, so it can be done.

Jeremy Corbyn was right, this Government is comprised of Stupid People. Worse than fiddling while Rome burns, this Government is plotting with PR to actually make conditions for its citizens worse and appeasing the ultra Right Wing who gathered terrible momentum, starting with the murder of MP Jo Cox.

And now Gatwick has been buzzed by drones, so this stupid government send in the Army! Over 4 days, they have demonstrated how a lack of Government planning and spending cripples them. They can not find the person controlling these drones! They can not even shoot them down.

150,000 citizens with a ruined holiday and countless business losses is the cost. This Government has wasted billions and cost the UK many thousands of lives by their negligence to pursue a policy to turn the UK into a subsidiary of Trump’s America with ultra low-taxes. All so the UK is not subject to tax haven regulations to be brought in by the EU just after the date that Britain is set to crash out of the EU.

Stupid People in Government. Stupid People who voted for them.

see also https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/20/national-emergency-brexit-vote-westminster?CMP=fb_gu&fbclid=IwAR1YlOmaflNZQRqc6RhAnf-7rJ-N2RXae-McziksnysZFrnRo7nDrQl311E

Shoot to kill

On By Nicholas AlexanderIn Leadership, police, Politics, terrorismLeave a comment

The Prime Minister, electioneering, has said that she fully supports “shoot to kill” while defending herself from the resonant accusation that she reduced the police forces during her time as Home Secretary and since by nearly 50,000.

“Shoot to kill” may sound like a brief action of a few armed officers but the concentration of automatic weapon brandishing officers in London has increased so much in the last ten years. The reduction in police on the beat has made the city feel under siege rather than safe.

Armed police are useless as investigators. As a last resort, they are more effective than a riot squad armed with batons, but it is only as a last resort are they at all effective. The PM is blind to the actual problem, she thinks that brute force is the only path to defeating terrorism, but it is actually the presence of many police with guns that normalises the fear and rewards terrorism for changing the way that we live, under constant reminders of threat.

London has over 2 million cameras which are nearly useless in detection but serve police well after an incident has occurred as investigatory tools. Reduction of police forces by such large numbers means that the support staff necessary to investigate and detect simply are not there. Being able to also now monitor internet chatter would not strengthen detection, it would require another 100,000 back office staff. There are not enough now to detect issues and thinking they can trail 20,000 people and predict that when they hire vehicle, they should be arrested, is plainly illogical.

To defeat terrorism, remove the reasons that stimulate it. Of course, there will always be radicals and insane criminality. Of course, there will always be thugs. But breeding them with an imbalanced society and starving the police of resources is Theresa May’s real crime. She is the cause of this rash of terrorism.

Clinton and Bush

On By Nicholas AlexanderIn Bill Clinton, Election, Iraq war, Leadership, left and right, President Obama, US political lifeLeave a comment

Bill Clinton and George Bush reveal their friendship when they appear together on TV. So it seems, at least. Perhaps they will cause world peace together but something is odd about this caucus of ex presidents. It is as though Clinton has embraced the devil vs the rehabilitation of Bush. The presidential campaign costs 3 billion dollars and yet this could swing voters, but which way is anyone’s guess. It is democracy in a bottle, diplomatic sages warning the next generation of bucks about to debate with each other.

The Euro crisis

On By Nicholas AlexanderIn economic regression, Economics, LeadershipLeave a comment

There are many ways to “solve” the crisis.

You do not win a game of chess by barking at the pieces on the board, but sacrifice can have huge dividends. Part of the crisis is one of leadership.

Our leaders keep talking but not facing the fact that the economic system is riddled with corrupt practices, magical mathematical models that distort value and they appear to be relying on these mechanisms “to induce real growth” while starving the participants in favour of those for whom tax avoidance is a religion and make fortunes by gambling on leveraged valuations for things that do not exist.

Posted as a comment in The Guardian, article.

The end of war

On By Nicholas AlexanderIn government, Leadership, Republican, WarLeave a comment

The End of War is a notion, certainly, but it is also a statement of intent. Many do not understand war as anything other than a force that some evil leads our side into, until our side bluffs its way into warfare and we then question if our leadership really does know what it is doing, what right it has to life and death and what the limits on use of armies as police are, and why.

Leadership has to be more than bravery and, let’s face it, being suckered up to by the manufacturers of weapons that require Governments to consume their armanents to stay in business is a source of election funding.

Americans may blame Jimmy Carter for things that were economic consequences of the massive cost of Vietnam. When shall we learn the Republican adventure is actually a larger and more expansionalist form of Government?