Burke

Edmund Burke, Irish MP for Bristol, was famous for writing a criticism of the French Revolution which inspired Thomas Paine to write "The Rights of Man". (We now say "human rights" because of Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt.) Burke established the principle that an MP is a free agent. This enables him to cross the floor of the House, even contrary to the wishes of his constituents. Today this principle is particularly pertinent because MPs are debating Brexit. Many MPs voted Remain in the Referendum on the European Union on 23 June 2016, while a majority of their constituents voted Leave. This is a conundrum big time! Burke also came up with the saying "All that is needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." Enoch Powell MP called immigration to the UK "a preventable evil"....

Trump

An epetition to keep President Trump out of the UK was signed by over half a million people. My epetition to stop foreign men using marriage to live in the UK got 735 signatures. Please see this blog of 11 November 2016. I'm grateful to those who signed but appalled by the disparity! The British are good at criticising other people but are not so good at putting their own house in order. Immigration caused Trump's election; immigration caused Brexit and now Northern Ireland's crisis. (A Sinn Fein spokesman - 16 Nov. BBC Radio 4 "Today" - specifically referred to Brexit as a major cause for Sinn Fein bringing down the Northern Ireland Government.) Strange that the Minister for Immigration at the time of the EU Referendum and now the Minister for Northern Ireland is a Mr. Brokenshire! The British fabled sense of humour (notably admired by Britons) is no substitute for solving problems rather than creating them. The UK's problems could have been avoided: Please see this blog of 10 June 2016 "Kamikaze Saga". Thanks! BBC Radio 4 "In Business" (8 Jan.) reported that during President Obama's tenure "at least 2.4 million people were deported" from the US. So President Trump won't be doing anything new if he keeps his promise and deports people who are in the US illegally.

Directions of Travel

"Sayonara" (Goodbye in Japanese) was a famous novel by James Michener, made into a film starring Marlon Brando. It tells of 2 American airmen who fall in love with Japanese women. Because of pressure by some American women they can't live together in the US if they marry. It ends with one couple committing suicide. In contrast to the UK, which had a lax approach to immigration until the 1962 Commonwealth Immigration Act, the US and Japan had very strict controls. President Johnson radically changed the US system in 1965. And Japan has been undergoing change. E.g., since 1983 foreign students have been allowed to work part-time; before then they couldn't. In 1977 I read in the Press the Conservatives' policy to stop foreign men using marriage to live in the UK would never succeed because it would be contested by the European Convention on Human Rights. I thought someone else would complain to the European Commission of Human Rights that foreign & Commonwealth men can live in the UK through marriage even though British men often cannot live in their countries through marriage. I didn't want to. But time passed & on 10 June, I did. There is nothing in the Convention about immigration. I cited Article 3, "cruel and inhuman treatment". My complaint was not investigated on the grounds I had not been the subject of a Government decision. This means, of course, that while everyone else in the world potentially has "rights" about living in the UK an Englishman doesn't. On 12 May 1982 (during the Falklands Conflict!) the ECHR determined in favour of 3 (non-British) women whose husbands weren't allowed to live in the UK. On 28 May 1985 the European Court of Human Rights endorsed this. In Japan the decision was taken in 1982 to allow foreign men to live & work in Japan through marriage. The law came into effect on 1 January 1985. Clearly Japan's activities in this area were in tandem with the Council of Europe's. Brexit shows that an enormous number of people in the UK are unhappy about immigration. Enabling people to have a choice of 2 countries in which to live does nothing to ease this unhappiness. On the contrary, the prospect of being able to live in 2 countries is an incentive for transnational marriages. So clearly applying pressure on Japan about this issue is counter-productive from a British perspective. Nor does it do any favour to Japan. The average Japanese woman has 1.4 babies. For many years, decades in fact, boys have substantially out-numbered girls....

Much is made of British Values - They need to be looked at....

1) When the Prime Minister was Home Secretary she talked about reducing the number of immigration appeals from 17 to 4.(!) Britons abroad can't avail themselves of such appeals. And these appeals assume a mistake on behalf of immigration officers. They are only one-way: if officers make a mistake by allowing someone to live in the UK there is no appeal against that! Plus, think of the bureaucracy (= public money) involved in all these appeals! (2) Other countries have ID cards. Britain's Parliament debated having ID cards back in the 1980s. The latest scheme involved having ID cards that would be voluntary! Barmy! There's no point in having them! No wonder (some 30 years later!) David Cameron finally scrapped the idea. So this served as a sign to potential illegals they can continue to know the best country in which to live undetected.... (3) Britain's much-vaunted National Health Service (our pride & joy!) is exploited by foreigners who come here to avail themselves of free health care and even to give birth (a great way to obtain British nationality!) No wonder the NHS is collapsing under the strain! The problem is recognised, but is dealt with by nurses (who have enough to do as it is!) traipsing along corridors carrying forms backwards and forwards, and asking questions the answers to which they have no means of checking. Other countries have ID cards for people who are entitled to medical care. That's so simple, but it's beyond the scope of British Values.... (4) Nurses trained in Britain can't get jobs because the NHS recruits from abroad. This was called "looting the Third World" by the former leader of the British National Party. The increasing demand for carers means that it's necessary to recruit from abroad. But many find work in old folks' homes to be onerous and so leave to find more congenial work. This is contrary to their visa, and so is illegal. It also means that more foreign & Commonwealth people come to the UK with a visa to work as a carer. (5) "We don't dispense justice; we dispense the law," so said a judge recently. It's clearly unjust that "nationality" is included in the Race Relations Act - it empowers foreigners to deprive Britons of work & promotion (an unnatural privilege). Judges enforce the law at the behest of Parliament. But lawyers prevent deportations contrary to the wishes of politicians! Our own Prime Minister complained about this when she was Home Secretary - famously citing the case of a man who, she said, couldn't be deported because he once had a cat! (6) Skill at compromise oiled the wheels of the British Empire; that has now transmuted to a Great British Muddle (would it were instead just a Great British Bake-off). Please see this blog "An Abnormal British Muddle (includes lavatory humour)" at 13 August 2016 Many thanks!

A Notorious Aversion to War

Sparta is in Lakonia. Spartans didn't talk much, hence the English word "laconic". One scholar curiously described Spartans as "notoriously" reluctant to go to war. The reason for their reluctance was because they had come from northern Greece, enslaved the locals in the 8th. century B.C. and were fearful of a slave revolt. The Olympics, also founded in the 8th c. (776 B.C.), were religious occasions dedicated to Zeus. The women's to his wife, Hera. Spartans avoided the wrestling because hardly anyone can always win, and Spartans didn't surrender. Sparta is in the news of late because of Thucydides who wrote "The Peloponnesian War" in the 5th c. B.C. Sparta was the established power facing the rising power of Athens. Sparta's King Archidamus was cited on 18 March 2003 in the House of Commons urging restraint over the invasion of Iraq. Athens was defeated in 404 B.C. following a calamitous war. Thucydides believed future wars would be caused by similar circumstances. In 1914 Britain and her allies were faced by the rising power of Germany. Now the US, soon to have a new (no shrinking violet) President has to cope with the rising power of China.... P.S. Sparta went into decline in the 4th c. B.C. and was defeated by her erstwhile ally Thebes.

The Passmore Paradox (Happy New Year!)

You want your country to have Peace & Prosperity; and you want people from other countries to like your country. And they do; not a few; too bad for you!