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Who needs ‘girl-friendly’ science when we could just have female scientists
I guess everyone’s come across the aphorism that ‘It’s better to remain silent and be thought a fool than speak out and remove all doubt’ even if there is considerable disagreement as to its origins.*
*A quick search on teh Interwebs shows it to have been attributed to Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, George Eliot, Mark Twain, Groucho Marx and someone called Sylvan Engel although, like many a good line, its actual origins appear to lie in the Bible – “Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.” Proverbs 17:28 (KJV)
By and large, the quote expresses the kind of well-intentioned sound advice that is perennially lost on politicians, as the government’s new School’s Minister, Sarah McCarthy-Fry, demonstrates to perfection in her first (and hopefully last) official interview in the Independent.
In her first interview since replacing Lord Adonis in the Prime Minister’s recent reshuffle, Sarah McCarthy-Fry told The Independent that she was concerned about getting more girls to opt for science and engineering at school – and thought separating the sexes for lessons in co-educational schools might be the answer.
Uh-oh… gender segregation in state schools might be the answer as in ‘pigs might fly’? continue reading… »
Top Stories – 27th Nov
Crisis still unfolding…
Army troops confront Mumbai attackers
Media reports update, NY Times
International reaction, in quotes
‘They were after Americans and Brits’
Comprehensive coverage from NDTV
Pictures from Mumbai (Flickr)
DAILY BLOG REVIEW / by Lee Griffin
Glenn Greenwald discusses John Brennan’s withdrawl from the running for an Obama administration spot. How much did bloggers play a part?
Liberal Eye writes a great piece that further explores why we cannot shop our way out of this crisis.
Mary Reid writes as good a rebuttal of the BNP as anyone, the way we should be fighting the BNP…with intelligence and common sense, not illiberal attitudes.
MKNE notes that aside from all of the economic issues in our news, we should also be paying attention to some key votes in Iraq over the next few months. Would Brown be secretly hoping to save money through being forced out of Iraq?
Toran Shaw echo’s what most are no doubt thinking, when MFI and Woolies can go bust, no-one can be truly safe. Except maybe Tesco.
Colin Ross wants to use the current climate to completely reform tax and benefit systems, though seemingly whilst ignoring EU rules at the same time!
Richard Baum gives a strong moral argument for why a C-Charge shouldn’t be accepted in Manchester.
5CC keeps up the sterling work in pointing out clear abuses of statistics in tabloids, this time about immigrants tekkin our jerbs.
CIC paper: Access to information
Liberal Conspiracy is publishing a series of discussions about the government’s Community Empowerment White Paper. This is a summary of the third chapter.
Chapter 3: Access to information
How can I find out information in a way I understand and can use?
Information is power say the paper, and a lack of information leads to powerlessness. Jargon can ‘alienate, confuse and frustrate citizens’ and be exclusionary. Barely half of local authority residents feel that their council keeps them very or fairly well informed about the services and benefits it provides.
The Internet is a powerful information delivery system but those without online access should not be forgotten. Information across the range of issues is being made available via the likes of NHS Choices. The government wants to support the use of new technologies.
A ‘Digital Mentor’ scheme in deprived areas will support groups to develop websites and podcasts, to use digital photography and online publishing tools. Community radio can have a unique role in working within communities.
Comments
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There is an economic narrative
I disagree with Sunny’s argument that Labour lacks a narrative for the economic crisis: it is very clear what the Labour public argument and narrative is: this has introduced a much clearer sense of what the major parties disagree about.
Secondly, I don’t see that Labour is losing the argument. I don’t claim the opposite. It is just too early to tell. Any incumbent government is going to be unpopular in a downturn, but Labour’s framing of the key debates is certainly making the political weather. It will take longer to judge what the public response is. The YouGov poll on the PBR is – as others here have noted – fairly positive for those who believe in a more active role for government in the recession.
But the more important thing at this stage is that centre-left should be clear about which arguments we should be trying to win.
What an odd idea of democracy, Boris
Boris Johnson beat Ken Livingstone in the London mayoral contest last May in big part because a lot of people wanted the right to drive their vehicles wherever, whenever and as fast as they like. Now he’s taking the first step towards paying them back for their support by announcing the abolition of the western extension to London’s congestion zone.
Actually, bicycle-riding Bojo didn’t have the ungreen guts to simply abolish the zone off his own bat. He disguised the decision as the product of a public consultation exercise. And he warned those who were ‘consulted’ that abolition would cost a lot of money, cause a lot of congestion, pollute the air in London even more than it is already and generally make life more difficult and unpleasant in the city. So he could palm off all responsibility for this environmental disaster in that bumbling Bojoish manner with a ‘Look, I did my jolly best to make the environmentalist case but the public just weren’t having it and who am I to ride my bicycle roughshod over their democratic verdict?’
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Woolworths and MFI – final sale
From the Guardian:
Furniture and kitchens specialist MFI has filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators, it was confirmed this afternoon. A notification of the company’s intention to file for administration was lodged at the high court last night and staff were told at meetings this morning that the store chain was about to fold, putting thousands of jobs at risk. The group was today offering 70% discounts on its website, with free delivery.
Reuters reports:
The board of DVDs-to-sweets retailer Woolworths will meet at 6 p.m. to approve a decision to put its retail and distribution businesses into administration, a source familiar with the matter said.
via Beau Bo D’Or
Top Stories and Blog Review – 26th Nov
Nationwide
The ‘British Fritzl’ and his reign of terror
Revealed: Labour’s £37bn stealth spending cuts
UK: All Starbucks’ coffee to be Fairtrade
GM passes begging bowl around Europe
International
U.S. plans $800 billion in lending to ease crisis
Blasts shut Bangkok airport
World’s top marijuana producers identified
Record crowd for Obama inauguration?
DAILY BLOG REVIEW / by Douglas Johnson
The Daily (Maybe) - on the Venezualan elections.
Tory Troll - has essential viewing for all the Nerdistanis.
The Enemies of Reason - considers whether the Mail really cares about suicide. Answer: no.
Jess McCabe - doesn’t understand the concept of Web 2.0 celebrities. Neither do I.
Hagley Road to Ladywood - Why will repeating the behaviour which created a crisis help end it?
J. Arthur MacNumpty - on the fury of Anne Moffat.
Agnes Poirier - Could the French socialists collapse any more farcically?
Why we need to protect Congo’s civilians, now
Eastern Congo is aflame again – but so far all we have from the world is talk and precious little action to show for it. It’s time to change that, if we don’t want a repeat of the failures of the Rwandan genocide, ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia and previous genocides in DRC. In the last three weeks alone, hundreds of thousands have been made refugees, rape, murder and pillage has surged, children have been abducted and pressed into militias… and the situation may be sliding into regional war, with talk of the countries who tore Congo apart before sending forces on either side.
The UN has voted to approve over 3000 reinforcements for its peacekeeping presence. But that force is in disarray, discredited by its failure to protect civilians and its closeness to brutal government troops — and no-one is yet offering to provide reinforcements.
The people of Congo, NGOs and former UN peacekeeping heads agree – only Europe looks able to act fast enough to put in a capable, neutral force to protect the vulnerable.
That’s why we at Avaaz among others have been campaigning with increasing urgency for a European force to protect eastern Congo’s civilians – and it would really help for the blogosphere to pile in.
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Why is the government losing this argument?
I frequently get the feeling this government would have trouble selling a Che Guevara t-shirt to a socialist, given how badly it is at communicating anything.
We are amidst the greatest financial crisis of several generations, with the world’s largest bank, Citigroup, and largest carmaker, General Motors, teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. Those who called loudly for more de-regulation and piously informed us that financial markets were looking after the interests of shareholders and pension funds are now running for cover. And yet New Labour still looks like its losing the public argument.
I think there are two reasons for this.
Firstly, it’s fighting the battle on a losing battle-field; its narrative is all wrong.
The Conservatives astutely made this a discussion about taxes and Public Sector Debt, and Labour has fallen directly into their trap. Instead, the government should be pointing out the need to keep retailers and our banks afloat – hence the tax breaks and banks guarantees and loans. For once I actually agree with Gerard Baker in that this stimulus doesn’t go far enough. But of course, while the Tories are trying to scare everyone about the coming tax bombshell, New Labour is too scared for anything radical enough to have an immediate impact.
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Council bans Christmas
Christmas just wouldn’t be Christmas without the familiar seasonal reports of local authority killjoys trying to ‘ban’ it. And like the Christmas displays in the shops, which the laws of commerce now require to be in place before the first leaves fall from the trees, the reports of the bans start earlier every year.
This year it was the city of Oxford that was first in the media firing line with the Oxford Mail’s ‘Council set to axe Christmas’ headline on 1 November setting the tone for a spot of ‘political correctness gone mad’-style bureaucrat bashing.
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