As I Please

We ended our previous blog in some confusion. Our excuse was and still is that we were merely reflecting the confusion and chaos that enveloped us at local, national and international level. 

Enough implausible excuses – we are beginning to sound like Rishi Sunak.

In the few days that have elapsed between our previous blog and this one some intriguing new issues have emerged.

Our competitors in the respectable media outlets and the wild west that comprises social media have been busy.

Let us crack on.

A stroll down memory lane.

Holdenforth has noticed that from time-to-time people in the news find the searchlight of the media focused on what they have been up to.

In the unlikely event that we find ourselves subjected to – shall we say The Rayner treatment – we will get our story out now.

Birth – I was born at the end of June, 1940 – just a few weeks after Dunkirk, the youngest of my mother’s nine children. That would date my conception around September 1939 – just around the time that Britain declared was on Germany. Not ideal family planning.

Boisterous politics – I recall being thrown out of Trafalgar Square during the sit down organised by the Committee of 100.

Sedate Politics – I was in the hall in Scarborough in 1963 when Harold Wilson delivered his “White Heat of Technology” speech. There can’t be many left who can say that.

I attended as a Young Socialist delegate from Ebbw Vale in the company of Michael Foot’s agent, Ron Evans. I remember Ron giving a surly greeting to a scruffy old timer on the way to the Hall. He then told me that old timer was called Gerry Healy – the then leader of Militant Tendency. Ron was very suspicious of the Trots. I also recall that Ron warned me to steer clear of a delegate called Tom Driberg – I can’t remember why.

My father was a plate layer – born in 1896 – who served in the Royal Engineers in WW1. In 1919 he was in a Railway Unit which operated in the Caucasus between Batuum on the East of the Black Sea and Baku on the West of the Caspian Sea. After the war he was glad to get back to his job as plate layer on the relatively peaceful line between Bolton and Lostock Junction.

Let us open the proceedings with a few items from our previous mission statements.

These basic preferences will help us to feel at home.

* The BBC – the case for privatisation goes stronger on a daily basis.

* The  transgender sector – no offence meant but our core case remains that “If my aunt had balls she would be my uncle but she didn’t and she wasn’t.”

* Long live the Remain cause

* The decline of the British manager. This sector is anxious to collect the rewards of the job – and equally anxious to avoid doing any work thus severing the link between the 2 components.  

There – we feel better already.

By far the most disturbing issue in the world continues to be the conflict in Gaza.

The scale of the conflict grows on a daily basis and the prospects for a peaceful outcome grow more and more unlikely. 

There are significant sub plots to this conflict including the war in Ukraine and THE WEST v Putin.

All Propaganda is Lies—- George Orwell

Holdenforth agrees with the bleak but realistic assertion made by Orwell.

We have noted the intense but bloodless war between the rival propaganda machines operated by Israel and Palestine. The mendacious work of these machines as they ransack the globe for financial support – let us call this struggle the conflict between the mendacious mendicants is of considerable significance because the propaganda machine operated by Israel is possibly the most effective in the world. This weapon has been and remains a formidable weapon in the Israeli war machine.

In a previous blog  we noted that:

“One closing point on this topic – Holdenforth has noted the non stop raucous resolute attack by Netanyahu on Hamas but we note also that he is strangely mute on the Zionist activities of the group which pioneered terrorism in the region -Irgun back in late 1940s.”

Holdenforth has been keeping an eye on the scoreboard as the conflict in Gaza has continued.

The casualties arising from the conflict have not been distributed evenly between The Israelis and the Palestinians – Palestinian fatalities, mostly civilians, are reported as being in excess of 30,000.

Holdenforth has also noted that support for the Israeli cause globally has steadily diminished as the number of deaths on the scoreboard has risen at a daily rate of 200.

The prospects for Ukraine

The situation and prospects here are broadly similar to those in Gaza – the ability of The Ukraine to continue the war with Russia is thought to be critically dependent upon the support of its paymasters in THE WEST.

A word about Mr Putin and THE WEST.

Mr Putin does not appear to be about to throw in the towel in this interminably protracted war.  

The latest word from the USA is that Mr Biden has put his real money where his somewhat erratic mouth is and that he has promised that the USA WILL provide sufficient support to enable Mr Zelensky to fight on.

The above points taken together promise a lucrative future for arms suppliers and an ongoing mixture of blood, toil, sweat and tears for those called upon to do the actual fighting.

In short, the prospects for WW3 sooner rather than later look increasingly likely.  

Update on illegals

The political struggle between the House of Lords and the House of Commons on the Rwanda policy of HMG has been brought to a conclusion of sorts with the Lords accepting the supremacy of the lower house.

The numbers being quoted suggest that the demand for sanctuary in the UK is considerably greater than the ability of those in charge in Rwanda to cope.

What will the outcome be?

Holdenforth would like to suggest a rethink of the core issues

Everyone – and that includes you and Holdenforth – will understandably constantly seek to achieve a better life for themselves and their families. So – how do nations and groups of nations reconcile the claims and wishes of the home population with the claims of their would-be neighbours? Completely open borders or effective controls effectively managed.  

Holdenforth argues that the latter option will minimise the damage to long term wider social stability.

“Says Labour about the migrant crisis -” the first thing to do is deal with the back log

No, it isn’t. If the bath-tub is overflowing the first thing to do is to turn off the taps, not try to empty it”

Did Mr Bradshaw of Cowbridge have a point in his letter to the Daily Mail?

Meanwhile, Holdenforth gathers that there is public concern about the high and rising number of immigrants seeking asylum in Ireland. One aspect of the situation which confuses Holdenforth is the allegation by some that the problem has arisen because Ireland rejected Brexit. We had assumed and still assume and will continue to assume that the problems arose because of the absurd decision by the UK to opt for Brexit.

The forthcoming presidential contest across the pond between the two aged candidates.

Holdenforth can speak with some authority on the melancholy prospect as he is (just) a little older than the shaky flaky President Biden and the bombastic ex -President Trump.

At the time of writing we are unsure as to whether Mr Trump may have to do his campaigning from the inside of a Prison cell.

Should the ex-Pres actually be locked up – might this pose a handicap to his campaign?

Notes on Arthur Balfour

The name of Arthur Balfour is mainly remembered as being the author of the Balfour Declaration. Holdenforth readers will recall the clause in the Declaration which read  “it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine”

Events did not quite work out as required by the Declaration.

Asked why he did not subscribe to a press cutting agency Arthur Balfour replied that “I have never put myself to the trouble of rummaging an immense rubbish heap on the problematical chance of discovering a cigar end”

Might Balfour have viewed today’s Social Media as a dubious source  of information despite the enormity of the material available. A mountain of rubbish?

Teesside – now and then

Now:  Mr Sunak , desperate to find something / anything, in the recent  local election results to build on, has hailed the success of Mr Houchen on Teesside. Holdenforth has followed the hostile war of words about Teesside between Mr Houchen and Private Eye.

Private Eye has argued that there have been dubious commercial practices carried out by Mr Houchen in his thrust to the top job.

It is difficult to judge the merits of the arguments put forward by the two sides from the outside but we urge our readers to watch this space.

Then: A decade or ago the Redcar steelworks on the south bank of the Tees was acquired by a Thai Steel Company. The relief was short-lived. The new venture ran into difficulties and The Thai owners withdrew their support.

What then followed resulted in the most disgraceful act of industrial vandalism in the history of the UK steel sector.

The Redcar Blast Furnace, one of the cleanest and most productive in Europe was closed in such a way that it could not be re-started.

Given that Mr Houchen is now firmly in the driving seat – Both HMG and the Labour opposition need to ensure that – should similar problems in South Wales and / or in British Steel in Scunthorpe result in closures – that Houchen doppelgangers do not seize the opportunities for easy pickings.

More on the recent local elections – Voters should keep an eye on the methods adopted by the rebuffed to seek to return to the fray, in other words to get on board the job creation scheme to protect those rejected in the various elections.

“What is any political campaign save a concerted effort to turn out a bad set of politicians who are admittedly bad and put in a set of politicians who are thought to be better? The former assumption, I believe, is always sound, the latter is just as certainly false. For if experience teaches us anything at all it teaches us this: that a good politician, under democracy, is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar. His very existence, indeed, is a standing subversion of the public good in every rational sense. He is not one who serves the common weal; he is simply one who preys upon the commonwealth …
HL Mencken:-The Politician

“The typical American law maker is willing to embrace any issue, however idiotic, that will get him votes, and he is willing to sacrifice any principle, however sound, that will lose them for him… they are in the position of the chorus girl who, in order to get her humble job, has had to admit the manager to her person “
H.L. Mencken :- Notes on Democracy

Holdenforth endorses the Mencken view of the Politician in a Democracy.

It has not been an edifying experience to observe politicians, rejected in one contest by the voters, scour our democracy to seek other opportunities in the vast and expanding framework of our various institutions – to conform to the Mencken model.

At what point might the number of jobs in this sector exceed the number of voters?

A case study to illustrate the above possibly caustic theory deployed in practice.

The House of Lords  – its performance and prospects

In an earlier blog Holdenforth noted that on a busy day The House of Lords resembles an old folks’ home and, on a quiet day, a morgue.

Can the very existence of this venerable creaking institution be reconciled with any version of democracy?

No – it can’t.

The unseemly return to public life of Mr David – now Lord – Cameron was yet another nail in its creaking coffin.

The actions of Mr Cameron following his defeat in the Brexit referendum were dubious – see the Greensill affair.

Mr Sunak was evidently prepared to overlook these transgressions and in one speedy manoeuvre Cameron was promoted to Foreign Secretary and membership of the Lords.

We rest our case.

Your aged blogger has run of steam but there is no shortage of topics once we have recharged our batteries – a mixed metaphor surely?

A brief trailer for our next blog

• Mr Kretinsky – this gentleman, a Czech business man, is thought to wish to acquire the Royal mail operation with no motive other than to ensure that the great British Public gets its mail on time at a price that it can afford
• Greedy Vice Chancellors – this story just runs and runs
• The endless supply of fat cats – see Greedy Vice Chancellors
• The scandal that is Grenfell – a scandal yet to be tackled

“Times they are a‘ changing” – Song by Bob Dylan

In 1957 – on the BBC Any Questions programme – Earl Ferrers was reported as saying that he “finds women in politics highly distasteful.” Does the team – which included Barbara Castle -agree?

Malcom Muggeridge commented that “the best governed and probably the most prosperous country in the world today is Switzerland, where women have not yet been given the vote”

At this point – Holdenforth makes a hasty exit.

As I Please

Holdenforth is on the mend – or so he has been informed by the NHS sector.

On the debit side – we have been receiving e mails from the Grim Reaper to indicate that our time is up.

In this blog we will derive inspiration from the courage of George Orwell as he worked in very difficult conditions towards the end of his life to complete 1984 in 1948.

More on the debit side – Holdenforth aka John Holden disagrees with almost everybody about almost everything – not a promising start.

What do you expect from a grumbling grousing grizzling griping grouchy octogenarian? 

Now – where had we got to – lots of issues – old and new – queuing up to be considered

A few easy old ones to get our show back on the road.

The BBC – privatise it!

The commendable policies of John Reith have long been abandoned.

The mission statement of today’s BBC is:-“There is no business like show business”. So be it. (Editor’s note: Strictly speaking the BBC’s mission statement is “to act in the public interest, serving all audiences through the provision of impartial, high-quality and distinctive output and services which inform, educate and entertain.)

The controversial comedian, Bernard Manning, argued that his control of the microphone during his stage appearances ensured that he was always in control of the proceedings.

This principle has been adopted by those on the wider stage at the BBC.  

The Holdenforth bollocks section

We have said this before and will probably say it again.

“If my aunt had bollocks, she would be my uncle but she didn’t and she wasn’t” – what could be clearer?

• Question – “Why does a dog lick its balls?”
• Answer  – provided by Jasper Carrott – “ because it can”
• Question – “why do the rich and powerful loot our scanty national resources?” 
• Answer – “because they can”
• Question – “when are the masses going to make a stand on these abuses?”
• Answer – “you tell me!

Any other useful deployments of the term?

How might the public at large sum up the performance of recent conservative governments?

How about – “They have made a bollocks of the job?”

 Any others?  One celebrity was said to have eyes bulging like a bulldog’s bollocks, but this was deemed abrasive by some.

Meanwhile, a diffident but simple suggestion regarding the LGBT sector:

In muted tones – Holdenforth begs those in the sector to do more of whatever it is that they do and rather less bawling in the streets about it.

Consider the consequences if the practice of publicly flaunting sexual preferences were to become universal.

There would be huge numbers of Steady Eddies – who like a bit now & again.

Possibly a good turnout of the Portnoy sector.

Let’s leave it at that and move on. 

The inverse content rule – Holdenforth asserts that as a general rule – the more fatuous the message the more raucous the proclamation as to its validity.

The small boats issue

As I write the political struggle between the House of Lords and the House of Commons on the Rwanda policy of HMG has been brought to a conclusion of sorts.

The numbers being quoted suggest that the demand for sanctuary in the UK is considerably greater than the ability of those in charge in Rwanda to cope.

What will the outcome be?

Holdenforth would like to suggest a rethink of the core issues.

Everyone – and that includes you and Holdenforth – will understandably constantly seek to achieve a better life for themselves and their families. So – how do nations and groups of nations reconcile the claims and wishes of the home population with  the claims of their would be neighbours?

Completely open borders – a bit like now really – or effective controls effectively managed.  

Holdenforth argues that the latter option will minimise the damage to long term wider social stability.

One final point here – given the ongoing turmoil in the Middle East in general and in Gaza in particular – what are the prospects of more than a million refugees from Gaza coming to the UK in large boats to escape their fate were they to remain in Gaza?

A word on The House of Lords – its performance and prospects

In an earlier blog Holdenforth noted that on a busy day it resembles an old folks’ home and, on a quiet day, a morgue.

Can the very existence of this venerable creaking institution be reconciled with any version of democracy?

No – it can’t.

It was bad enough before the squalid hasty elevation of Mr -Now Lord – Cameron to its ranks.

Compensation for past crimes

In recent months Holdenforth has gathered that there are several groups clamouring for compensation for the abuses endured by their ancestors down the centuries. These groups include descendants of slaves in The West Indies and across Africa.

The descendants of the Trevelyans are said to be inundated with claims.

Holdenforth would like to join this queue. My ancestors in Ireland were appallingly treated by Sir Charles Trevelyan in the 1840s.

In his essay “Genocide” the historian AJP Taylor wrote that “nearly 2 million Irish people died of starvation and fever within five years; another million fled bearing disease to Liverpool and the New World”

The Trevelyans inflicted  appalling additional cruelty on some of the Irish victims. The poignant song – “The fields of Athenry” – memorably sung by Paddy Reilly, has acquired the status of an anthem because  Irishmen “who stole Trevelyan’s that the young might see the morn”  were transported to the other side of the world.

My maternal great grandparents were among those who moved from Ireland to England to escape the famine.

Holdenforth aka John Holden would like to register a claim to be compensated.

Global Conflicts

Holdenforth detects a pattern of sorts in the various actual and possible global conflicts:

The prospects for Gaza:

In a previous blog we noted “the non-stop raucous resolute attack by Netanyahu on Hamas but we note also that he is strangely mute on the Zionist activities of the group which pioneered terrorism in the region -Irgun back in late 1940s.”

Holdenforth has been keeping an eye on the scoreboard as the conflict in Gaza has continued.

The casualties arising from the conflict have not been distributed evenly between The Israelis and the Palestinians – Palestinian fatalities, mostly civilians, are reported as being in excess of 30,000.

Holdenforth has also noted that support for the Israeli cause globally has steadily diminished as the number of deaths on the scoreboard has risen at a daily rate of 200.

The prospects for Ukraine

The situation and prospects here are broadly similar to those in Gaza – the ability of The Ukraine to continue the war with Russia is thought to be critically dependent upon the support of its paymasters in THE WEST.

And some in the WEST are reported as being uneasy about throwing good money after bad.

Mr Putin does not appear to be about to throw in the towel in this interminably protracted war.  

The latest word from the USA is that Mr Biden has put his money where his somewhat erratic mouth is and that he has promised that the USA WILL provide sufficient support to enable Mr Zelensky and Mr Netanyahu to fight on. For good measure Mr Biden warned China not to seek the return of Taiwan. 

The above points taken together promise a lucrative future for arms suppliers and an ongoing mixture of blood, toil, sweat and tears for those called upon to do the actual fighting.

In short, the prospects for WW3 sooner rather than later look ominous. 

Hooray for Nigel!

Holdenforth was startled a week or so ago by a very rum episode triggered by the intervention of a minor official in Brussels to abort a perfectly reasonable conservative conference.

Once again Nigel Farage was and remains the  hero of the hour – and rightly so.

It has also been reported that there is still some unfinished business regarding the debanking scandal and here Farage is absolutely right to get after those responsible.

On the debit side Farage may be slightly anxious about the fate of his trans-Atlantic hero, ex- President Trump. Holdenforth concedes that Mr Trump may find it difficult to campaign for the Presidency from the inside of a prison cell.

In conclusion

Once again, we have run out of time and energy.

A trailer for our next blog:

• The Woke sector – Holdenforth needs to find out exactly what the Wokers want before pontificating.
• The decline of the British Manager- we plan to consider how this sector has contrived to shrug off the work whilst continuing to harvest the benefits.
• Smoking – A small item on this topic – Smoking triggered a few identity problems in our house in my early years. My parents and many siblings were all smokers – I couldn’t see them for smoke!
• Welsh affairs- How will the return to normality on the roads change things. I have a slightly embarrassing interest to declare – I have attended TWO speed awareness courses.

As I Please

A gloomy preamble to a gloomy blog

“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity …

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the second coming is at hand…
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
From “The Second Coming” by WB Yeats

Background notes to this blog

There has been no letup in the intensity of the political struggles within the UK political parties in recent weeks. The pundits ponder interminably in print and on the airwaves about which event is more likely to come first – the next general election or World War 3.

Other issues competing for our attention include racialism, anti-

Semitism, Muslim activities, the increasing gap between rich and poor, democracy – the list is endless – and there is confusion everywhere.     

In this blog Holdenforth will comment on these and other issues. We make no pretence to be impartial or independent but we will do our utmost to adhere to the central Orwellian principle of sticking to the truth. 

To get our show on the road Holdenforth asserts that the UK is a national Augean stable.

What, I hear you ask, is the meaning of Augean?

Augeus was the king of Elis in ancient Greece, and he had a problem. His problem was that he owned 3,000 oxen whose stalls had not been cleansed for 30 years. If you do the calculation, you will see that Augeus had on his hands a lot of bullshit.

Let us continue. 

Holdenforth accepts that we need to state to our readers what we would actually do were we to find ourselves in a position to do it.

We also plead guilty to the charge that we disagree with almost everyone about almost everything, that Holdenforth is a grizzling griping grousing grumpy old timer. And we assert that on most contentious issues we have been in the right.

Don’t say that you have not been warned.

Israel, Gaza and Anti- Semitism

There is strong competition for the title of the most worrying conflict in the world as I write 6. For Holdenforth, the most worrying conflict is that between Israel and Hamas that has been raging for the past five months.

Holdenforth notes that around 200 hundred innocent civilians – mostly women and children – are being murdered in Gaza on a daily basis as the various academic debates continue about the rights and wrongs of these murders.

We pose the question to Israel in general and Netanyahu in particular – how many more innocent people are to be murdered before you call off the dogs of war. Possibly the most harrowing event now taking place anywhere in the world is the treatment by Israel of the two million inhabitants of Gaza, a tiny narrow strip of land – approximately 45 square kms -to the south and west of Israel.

It is in this tiny area that Hamas operates and in which the October 7 attack was planned.

In the 5 months or so that have elapsed since October 7 Israeli forces have inflicted huge casualties on the civilian population.

In our time there is no shortage of extremely effective propaganda machines.

To illustrate the point the Israelis rightly and raucously highlight that Hamas is a terrorist organisation but they are quite reticent on the terrorist organisation that brought Israel to power, namely Irgun.

Other critics of Israel point out that the Balfour /Lloyd George declaration in 1917 was conceding land to the Zionist Organisation that was not theirs to dispose of. That consideration would not have weighed heavily with Lloyd George and Arthur Balfour.

“In Palestine there was irreconcilable conflict between Arabs and  Jews.”
English History 1914 to 1945, AJP Taylor

“The Balfour Declaration was abandoned after 20 years of attempting to reconcile the irreconcilable. It was no doubt unreasonable that the Arabs of Palestine should pay the whole price of what was a world problem, anti Semitism.”
Extract from English History – AJP Taylor

Where does Holdenforth stand on the most worrying issue of today – the conflict between Israel and Palestine – or, or many refer to it- the conflict between Israel and Hamas?

As I write the media – official and social – are replete with details of the atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists in Gaza. 

For its part Israel has vowed to inflict retribution on those responsible.

Back to Lloyd George and Arthur Balfour  

In Year 2 of the first world war – 1915 – Lloyd George, in his capacity as Minister of Munitions, was concerned about the acute shortage of explosives.

He contacted Professor Weizmann, an accomplished chemist, to explain the problem to him and to seek his help. Professor Weizmann quickly solved the problem and his achievement was a most important contribution to the British war effort.

Lloyd George asked him how he, Lloyd George, might reward Weizmann for his work.

To quote Lloyd George, “Weizmann explained his aspirations as to the repatriation of the Jews to the sacred land they had made famous. When I became Prime Minister in December, 1916, I talked the matter over with Mr Balfour – the outcome was the famous Balfour declaration in 1917.”

This declaration read:

“His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.”

During the next 28 years the collective mind of the Jewish Diaspora was understandably pre-occupied with the murderous activities of Hitler in pursuit of his final solution of the Jewish problem.

In post war Palestine the British Government attempted to maintain peace between Jewish immigrants and existing Palestinian communities. This was not an easy task and the UK sought to relinquish the mandate.

One feature of this phase was the emergence of Irgun, a Zionist group roughly equivalent to Hamas in Gaza today.

In the years from the end of WW2 to 1948 Irgun proved to be masters in using terror to secure their aims. Given the scale and severity of the terror the British Government of Mr Atlee wished to be relieved of the mandate.

The Irgun Group wrote the textbook for terrorism that has been imitated around the world to this day.

It is ironic that the “terror” tactics employed by Hamas are taken out of the Irgun textbook.

The State of Israel was established in the summer of 1948.

Events in Palestine since 1948 have seen years of the steady expansion of Israel at the expense of Palestine and others.

Israel continues to occupy and even extend illegal settlements, a point noted in the last week by Mr Gutierrez, the Secretary General of the UN despite the opposition of the United Nations.

“All the devouring and insatiate Monsters imagined since imagination could record itself are fused in the one realisation, Guillotine. And yet there is not in France, with its rich variety of soil and climate, a blade, a leaf, a root, a sprig, a pepper corn which will grow to maturity under conditions more certain than those that have produced this horror. Crush humanity out of shape once more and it will twist itself into the same tortured forms. Sow the same seed of rapacious license and oppression over again and it will surely the same fruit according to its kind.”
From “A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens

In the above extract Dickens was making the simple point that the horrors of the French Revolution arose from the suppression of the people by the ruling class in previous years.

• Thus – The French Revolution
• Thus the emergence of Hamas

The terms and conditions of the Balfour declaration have drifted down the years away from Palestinian claims and in favour of Jewish claims.

It is not easy to predict a civilised lasting settlement to this frightening conflict, the origins of which go back into the mists of time.

For our part we hope for the best but we fear the worst as the daily toll of deaths mounts.

We would go further – Netanyahu, the most powerful figure in the Middle East, sadly combines the mendacity of Goebbels, the viciousness of Himmler, the arrogance of Goering and the humbug of Mr Pecksniff – an unedifying combination.

A few words on the conflict between the free world and Mr Putin being waged in the Ukraine

This conflict is now well into its third year and there are few signs that the war will end any time soon.

Holdenforth would like to rewind the tape of history back to the Crimean War waged between France and Britain on the one side and Russia on the other side in 1854.

“If there was a moral to be drawn from the Crimean War (1854 to 1856) it would be this: in a war between Russia and The West, it will be the Powers which keep out who will be the real gainers”
From “Crimea: the War that would not boil”, an essay by AJP Taylor.

Does the verdict of AJP Taylor on events which took place almost 200 years ago have any relevance today?

Holdenforth thinks that it does.

The outcome of this conflict today – Putin versus The West – is difficult to predict despite the daily detailed accounts about what is happening.

Holdenforth is mindful of the advice of Orwell that “all propaganda is lies”

Holdenforth follows this advice and tries to be wary about swallowing the information fed out by both sides.

Thus:

We accept that the NATO net is tightening to the north of Russia.

Russia is tightening its grip in Eastern Ukraine.

Ukraine is experiencing a shortage of munitions as its suppliers become increasingly anxious about throwing good money after bad. 

It is reported in some quarters that some supporters of the Ukraine cause are dubious about the performance of Zelensky as a latter day Kitchener.

Others have been comforted by the suggestion of Mr Macron that now might be the time to put western boots on to the ground and into the fray, a suggestion that did not meet with universal western approval.

The careless work of the German Intelligence Department in allowing The Kremlin to listen to sensitive conversations about what NATO was planning to do next did little to bolster the confidence of the beleaguered Ukrainians in the day to day conduct of the war.

Just a thought – Mr Zelensky has been strident that Putin and his henchmen be brought to justice once Ukraine has emerged victorious.

Where does Zelensky stand on the conflict in Gaza? At what level of fatalities might he say that enough is enough?

The death of Mr Navalny.

The available evidence suggests that Putin is as contemptuous as Netanyahu about the murders that he is prepared to authorise in order to secure his objectives and strengthen his position.

Just as Netanyahu follows the Irgun rule book so Putin is prepared to follow the example of Stalin in his pursuit of Trotsky.

Gosh – Trotsky again in an Holdenforth blog. We are merely reporting and have no links with Momentum.

Notes on democracy

Many Western commentators on the prospects of WW3 breaking out rightly stress the importance of democratic safeguards in their various institutional arrangements.

What then is democracy?

“Democracy is that system of government under which a great free people having 35 million people to choose, pick out a Coolidge to be head of state. It is as if a hungry man set before a banquet prepared by master cooks … should stay his stomach by eating and catching flies.”
Thus HL Mencken on Coolidge in 1927.

What are we to make of the selections of Biden and Trump respectively in 2024?

“The democratic method is that institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power to decide by means of a competitive struggle for the people’s vote”
From “Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy” by Joseph Schumpeter.

Holdenforth is happy to second this definition.

It is quite easy to spot the difference between regimes which abide by this definition and those which don’t.

All those living in Europe and North America will testify to the ferocity of the competitive struggle for the people’s vote.

Mr Putin pays lip service to the principle but those contemplating participating in the struggle in Russia are understandably uneasy about the hazards posed by joining in the competitive struggle.

Holdenforth is ready to acknowledge the strong democratic credentials of Israel – the opponents of Mr Netanyahu in Israel are only too ready to expatiate on his weaknesses.

In defence of Nigel Farage

For Holdenforth aka John Holden – what follows will not be easy to write but our claim to be honest and fair must be demonstrated.

Holdenforth has disagreed with Farage’s tireless efforts in the past decade to urge the cause of Brexit and we have said so in numerous blogs. He could accurately be described as the Founding Father of Brexit.

On the credit side in Farage’s favour we gladly acknowledge his successful campaign to expose the shabby tactics employed in the financial sector to refuse banking facilities to those deemed on flimsy grounds or on no grounds to be unsuitable.

Farage has to be congratulated for his successful campaign to expose the pitiful attempts by HMG to control the steady flow of illegal immigrants from Europe into the UK. His key point has been that all these immigrants are breaking the law because they are already in a safe country and therefore at no risk.

And Farage has led the fight to highlight the sheer absurdity of seeking to transfer those whose applications have failed to Ruanda – a costly embarrassing failure.  All small boat arrivals are criminals because they are NOT at risk in France.

Farage has been and continues to be right. 

There – we said it.

Defence of the realm

Holdenforth has been shaken by the catalogue of serious failures in recent months about the reliability of some of the key sections of our defence arrangements. Erratic missiles and poor maintenance performance of key ships come to mind.

I recall that many years ago there was a rumpus when a half-eaten pork pie was found in the sharp end of a British missile.

We had assumed that such sloppiness had been rooted out but evidently that has not been the case.

When the time comes – to go over the top –  do we seek a postponement until our repairs are completed?

The Post Office scandal

We have had our say in previous blogs about this interminably protracted scandal

Right now, we will limit ourselves to insisting that the criminal proceedings to be taken against senior post office managers be speeded up.

This action and the proceedings carried out by Win Williams are not mutually exclusive.

Gorgeous George

George Galloway and his tirades against Keir Starmer – a damp squib or a real threat to the electoral prospects of the Labour Party in 2024?

Holdenforth would like to contribute to the Galloway debate but his most recent visit to Rochdale was to watch a Rugby League match between Rochdale Hornets and Warrington in 1954. This gap of 70 years may make our awareness of what is happening in the town a little dated.

Getting On

We referred earlier to the probable contest between President Biden v  Mr Trump in the November Presidential election.

Holdenforth is confused about this prospect.

On the one hand we are delighted at the confidence shown in octogenarians by the political machines of the Democrats and Republicans.

On the other hand, Holdenforth will be 84 in a few months’ time and he is only too aware of the validity of the jibe by Shakespeare on this theme:

“And then from to hour we ripe and ripe
And then from hour we rot and rot
And thereby hangs a tale”

Speaking as an octogenarian – but NOT claiming to represent old timers – I am relaxed about aged fingers on nuclear weapon triggers – but I would not be relaxed if I were still on the ripe and ripe section of life. 

Two observations

*Holdenforth noted the comedy aspects of the group photo which included Queen Camilla and Vanessa Redgrave . The former has been a tireless worker to secure promotion from the slightly unseemly role as the mistress of the Prince of Wales to the rather more exalted title of the Queen of England.

Dame Vanessa Redgrave was at one time a ferocious member of the Trotsky movement dedicated to the overthrow of the existing social order.

If you can’t beat ‘em then join ‘em!

* “Junior City lawyers in line for £2m pay packet”
Headline in the Daily Mail, February 27^th

One sector of the national economy that is running counter to the national trend is the professional legal sector where affluence can be found in abundance. They flourish not only in advising on issues within the UK but also internationally as obscure disputes are brought to the UK to be resolved usually in painfully protracted proceedings.

“ It appears that there’s gold in them there courts.”

Notes by the editor

The editor would like to respond to a couple of the points made in Holdenforth’s latest epistle. The first concerns Mr Zelenksy’s public utterances (or lack of) on the conflict in Gaza. I would diffidently suggest that there are at least two possible reasons for this, which are not mutually exclusive: both are equally plausible. The first is that Mr Zelensky has not provided his hot take on Gaza, or the Anglophone conflict in Cameroon, or the Boko Haram crisis, or the Schleswig-Holstein question, or United’s chances in the cup, because he has other priorities, such as dealing with a Russian invasion. The second is that, what with said Russian invasion taking its toll on national resources, he is anxious to maximise the number of potential allies who might be willing to contribute in whatever way to the war effort: history is littered with national leaders who have been obliged to hold their nose in this way.

The second concerns the blanket assertion that “all small boat arrivals are criminals because they are NOT at risk in France”. My response here will take a little more of your time, and will take in (amongst other things) a Fellowship in Leeds, the mendacity of the populist right, the Chichester Park Hotel and the assiduous research of Dr Matthew Sweet.

In the latter half of the 1990s, I was engaged by the Institute of Communications Studies, University of Leeds to read the newspapers for a living. There was a little more to it than that: if I came across an article pertaining to immigration, asylum seekers, racism, xenophobia or right-wing extremism I was then obliged to log it in an Access database under an extensive coding scheme. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there was a little more to be logged in the Mail or the Sun than in the Guardian, but as a proportion of the whole, across all newspapers, not many articles needed to be logged. I would venture to suggest that were the exercise to be repeated in the current climate, those proportions would be far higher: for the past decade or so, the Daily Express in particular has devoted many of its pages to particularly unpleasant diatribes about foreigners (indeed, its front pages in that time seem to include pretty much nothing else, apart from perhaps the Royal Family and wholly erroneous long-term weather forecasts).

The Express (and its broadcast media equivalent, GB News) have sought to inflame the debate with dangerous, misleading rhetoric which should not go unchallenged.

Firstly, the notion of ‘first safe country’ is not to be found in international law; The 1951 Refugee Convention does not require a person to claim asylum in the first safe country they reach and explicitly states that asylum seekers should not be penalised for irregular entry into a country in which they intend to submit an application for refugee status”. This point has been reaffirmed on numerous occasions both in international law and, in 1999, by a British court.

So: not criminal, which is Holdenforth’s main objection. However, I think we need to dig a little deeper. There are those (not, I would emphasise, Holdenforth) who might then ask, “Why are they coming here, guv? Why don’t they just stay in France?” Without bothering to look at facts, those asking the questions typically satisfy themselves that the answer is (a) benefits (b) taking our jobs (c) raping our women (d) conducting terrorist activities or (e) all of the above.

Let us try and answer that question.

To begin with, if the asylum seekers have a smattering of a second language, it tends to be English rather than French. Secondly, France receives far more asylum seekers than the UK, and only a very small proportion of those (albeit a significant number) can be found camped out in atrocious conditions in ‘The Jungle’ settlement at Calais. Thirdly, it should be observed that the far right in France is well established; many politicians have built careers on the back of racist, Islamophobic and indeed anti-Semitic public utterances; its police can be trigger happy with the pepper spray and the tear gas: in short, France can be unpleasant if you are Black, Jewish and don’t speak French. Fourthly, those seeking asylum in the UK may have family members living in the UK, or else will be seeking support from the wider diaspora based in the UK.

Next, it is important to emphasise that many of these individuals are not economic migrants, but have been displaced by internal conflicts (often instigated, at least in part, by Western interventions). They are fleeing death, torture or sexual assault. They are desperate. Many are easy prey to the gangs who extort considerable sums of money from them, in return for allowing them – allowing them! – to risk their lives in a perilous Channel crossing.

Many of those that do succeed would be more than happy to take any jobs that are available, particularly in the informal sector: crop picking, car cleaning, working in fast food restaurants. Indeed, in crop picking, they are essential to the sector’s viability. They are not coming for the benefits (which, in France, are slightly higher).

Nor are they here to rape our women. There have recently been demonstrations (primarily consisting of extremists bussed-in from outside the area) outside the Chichester Park Hotel, now used as temporary housing for asylum seekers. The fact that those asylum seekers are overwhelmingly women and children has not deterred the demonstrators from insisting that there are sexual predators on their doorstep. (Furthermore, there is no evidence to suggest that asylum seekers are any more likely to commit sexual offences than the population at large.)

But the Express or GB News will not have this, because whipping up anger is their game. The latter does this by riffing on populist (primarily xenophobic) fears while encouraging a raft of ludicrous but potentially highly dangerous conspiracy theories. The writer and broadcaster Matthew Sweet has devoted considerable time and energy to exposing their mendacity; I would just like to dip my toe into these unpleasant waters by highlighting a few of them:

• The channel regularly features Neil Oliver, who spends most of his time making false claims about the COVID-19 vaccine (e.g. that it causes new kinds of blood clots) and fictional “turbo” cancers or else claiming that the Jews are planning to impose a “one-world” government. In January 2024, he agreed with an interviewee who claimed that “a mysterious group” (whom she named elsewhere as the Jews) had a plan to turn us into cyborgs.

• In 2022, it included several interviews on the Mark Steyn programme with Naomi Wolf, who described the vaccination rollout as “mass murder” and compared it to the actions of doctors “in pre-Nazi Germany”. (Steyn himself delivered misleading monologues about the rollout before leaving the channel after it decided to make him personally liable for any future Ofcom fines. Wolf has since gone even further down the rabbit hole, insisting that “they” are enabling time travel and putting chips in our arms via the vaccine.)

• This week GB News has complained that a gentleman called Sam Melia was imprisoned for two years for distributing stickers that read “It’s OK to be white”. Melia, a former member of a proscribed far right group, was actually imprisoned for plastering anti-Semitic stickers outside Jewish schools.

The channel has also provided a platform for far-right groups such as Voice of Wales (now banned from mainstream online outlets) and former members of proscribed organisations such as For Britain.

And behind all this nonsense, this poison, sits Farage the ringmaster, the peerless populist always staying just the right side of the legal line so that he can avoid charges of outright racism while playing to his audience with a concoction of half truths and plain lies, deftly fomenting discontent. It remains to be seen whether he will return to front line politics with Reform UK; if so, it is unlikely that he would risk standing for Parliament again, because that is a game he might well lose. Rather, he will be Reform’s cheerleader from the sidelines, hoping that after the Conservative Party’s probable demolition at the imminent General Election that Reform, bolstered by the rump of the Tory right, might be in a position to push for power further down the line.

Like Trump, Farage has blossomed in the unfiltered post-Twitter world, where everything, even the obvious truth, can be dismissed as “fake news”. However, it is important to challenge those dismissals, and to ensure that facts – cold, hard, facts – are presented are such, and xenophobia called out for what it is.

As I Please

Once again we find ourselves lured into blogging despite our requirement for a break from the stresses triggered by our

efforts to remain calm and objective in the pervasive chaos that surrounds us.

Let us start on a gloomy note – Capital Punishment

Holdenforth was startled by the news item from the USA which reported that a prisoner had been executed using a novel technique of suffocation. We were startled for two reasons:

• We had assumed that the Americans – given their predilection for meeting out punishment around the Globe to countries deemed to be opponents of the country of Mom and Apple Pie could get this particular treatment right.

• We also noted that the suffocated prisoner had already served 20 years in prison.

Holdenforth recalled an account by the then chief hangman in the UK – Albert Pierrepoint – of the death by hanging method used in British Prisons.

Pierrepoint had appeared before a Royal Commission chaired by Sir Ernest Gowers – a stickler for accuracy.

He, Pierrepoint, told the Commission that the under the British method the condemned person died immediately.

Holdenforth disapproves of capital punishment but were we ever to be sentenced to death with the solace of choice of methods we would opt for the Pierrepoint way.

An even gloomier issue – World War Three may be coming to a battlefield near you.

Holdenforth has been disconcerted by the widespread media speculation that World War Three is about to break out.

Let us start this topic on a personal note.

Holdenforth aka John Holden was born at the end of June in 1940. If you do the sums, you will note that he was conceived at roughly the same time as Britain declared war on Germany because of the invasion by Germany of Poland.

Some might be critical of the family planning approach of my parents especially as Holdenforth when he arrived on the scene was their 8th child – but I digress.

Surely – given all the horrors of WW1 And WW2 – no one could contemplate for a moment any return to the insanity of war. 

“If we don’t want death, blackouts, and busybodies in every corner of our lives, end this brainless march to war”
Peter Hitchens, Mail on Sunday, January 28th

“The Russkies are coming, Captain Mainwaring…. Don’t panic”
Headline above the Richard Littelejohn column, Daily Mail, January 26th

In his column, Littlejohn outlined his concerns about the readiness of the UK to fight a major war.

His first paragraph read:

“Britain is ill prepared for war according to the outgoing chief of the armed forces. General Sir Patrick Sanders warns that we must build up a combined force of 500,000 full time troop and reservists… this is the minimum number necessary to defend ourselves”

Our current defence secretary, Grant Shapps, has warned that we are moving from our postwar world to a prewar world. Holdenforth assumes that Mr Shapps knows what he is talking about.        

However:

• In WW1 – hundreds of thousands rushed to volunteer to enlist at the outset. 

• WW 2 proved less attractive in terms of the readiness of the people to be attracted by the call to arms but there were few problems once the conflict got under way.

Holdenforth has noted that there appears to be little popular enthusiasm to exchange the latest fashion beloved by the young for military livery.

If the rush to WW3 continues we suspect that some modern form of modern press ganging would be organised.

Could you really see our current Prime Minister or possibly his successor as latter day Kitcheners and as plausible effective recruitment agents on huge prominent posters?

No – neither can Holdenforth.

“Your country needs you” proclaims the poster!

To which most of those targeted respond – “It can carry on needing” – cue another Carry On film with a latter-day Charles Hawtrey as a Conscientious objector.                                                                                                                           

By the way – why does Holdenforth remain a Remainer?

One significant reason – On July 1,1916 – 20,000 British Soldiers were killed on Day 1 of the Somme offensive.

There is surely a more civilised way of resolving disagreements between nations.

Might there be other reasons why the young men and women of today would be less enthusiastic than previous generations to enlist?

Speaking only for ourselves Holdenforth is not enthusiastic about the following features of our national life:

• The Government headed by Mr Sunak that has resurrected the presumed political corpse of David Cameron.

• An elite that steadily increases the membership of the House of Lords – the retirement home of those who have thrived on the decaying institutions of the UK.

• A country owned to a huge extent by off shore sharp practitioners.

• A country unable the halt the steady flow of illegal but thus far unarmed immigrants.

• A country with a Tory faction that in the midst of our many travails is anxious to see the return of Boris Johnson to front line politics.

• An opposition which – so far as Holdenforth can discern, has but one policy – to secure the keys to No 10 Downing Street in the next election. Commendably simple but hardly inspiring.

“A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit …. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them”
Matthew 8, verses 18-20

Some critics of the UK see us as a country which bawls about its dedication to the ideals and traditions of democracy but is shaky when it comes to doing something about it.

What factors are thought to be significant in the context of preparing for a global conflict?

Holdenforth has noted that some of these factors are linked to the activities and actions of Israel following the Hamas led assault on October 7 last year.

These include:

• Threats to international shipping through the Suez canal.

• The daily deaths of around 200 non combatants in Gaza –  a somewhat disproportionate response by Israel. Israel takes care to distinguish between the activities of Hamas and its consequences for those unfortunate enough to live in Gaza.

Holdenforth notes that the arguments to prepare for WW3 are all too often associated with the pugnacious approach of Netanyahu and the chaotic approach of poor old Joe Biden.

What do Holdenforth readers think of having the shaky finger of the aged President on the nuclear button?

Note the Mission Statement operated by the State Department of the USA – “when you have them by the balls their hearts and minds will follow”.

One closing point on this topic – Holdenforth has noted the non stop raucous resolute attack by Netanyahu on Hamas but we note also that he is strangely mute on the Zionist activities of the group which pioneered terrorism in the region -Irgun back in late 1940s.

The NHS

“What do you think about England  – this country of ours where nobody is well.”
WH Auden, 1931

What has happened to the health of the nation in the past 90 years?

The major improvement was the introduction of a National Health Service which provided a comprehensive service free at the point of use. Briefly, this laudable reform meant that everyone and especially those least able to pay for medical care could obtain the help needed when they needed it.

Sadly, the NHS – after flourishing for decades – has now succumbed to declining standards. Much of the decline can be traced to a decline in the performance of NHS senior managers.

Davos and The Mafia

Holdenforth has noted an unfortunate resemblance between the public activities of the Mafia families in the USA that control much of the highly organised crime that is such a notable feature of that Country and the annual conference of the super-rich at Davos. Both sectors are anxious to draw attention to their laudable objectives but the wider public senses a credibility gap between slogans and actions.

See our earlier quote from The Sermon on The Mount.

A word about the current problems facing the UK Steel Sector

Time was when Holdenforth could speak with some authority on this subject.

Not now.

However, we have to say that we were confused when we watched a recent very public confrontation between TU leaders together with the MP for Aberavon on the one hand and two very senior managers from Tata Steel on the other hand.

We were not sure what part, if any, was played by Mr Sunak as he sought to strike a balance between the votes of the steelworkers and the votes of the zero sector on the other.

In the 1980 eighties Holdenforth managed an Electric Arc Furnace for eight years – long enough to grasp that the head count to make steel via the Electric Arc Furnace route was substantially less than that produced by the Blast Furnace route.

I suspect that nothing has changed.

A modest proposal put forward by Holdenforth

Holdenforth gathers that there are in our midst many thousands of old timers who – for a variety of reasons – are unable to access the required level of support from the caring sector.

We also gather that there are in our midst many thousands from the portly sector who struggle to lose weight by time honoured means and resort to surgery to achieve trimmer figures.

Holdenforth can confirm from personal experience that if those from the portly sector were to provide for the needs of old timers in need of care  on a 24/7 basis the pounds surplus to requirements would be shed in a few weeks – a  win-win outcome – and no pun intended for our editor.

A diffident assertion on a contentious issue

There has been understandable media interest in recent weeks about the evil murder of a member of the trans sector.

On the central issue of the case put forward by this sector Holdenforth can only repeat what we have said in previous blogs:-

“If my aunt had bollocks, she would be my uncle but she didn’t and she wasn’t.”

It may well be the case that the trans sector was and is unhappy with the hand dealt by nature but that does not alter the basic biology

of the situation. 

We will leave it there on this one.

The decline of the British manager.

Holdenforth intends to return to this topic in a future blog.

For now we will simply state our policy.

Successful managers will be allowed to keep their jobs.

Failing managers will be promptly handed a P45.

A case study here – many – if not most senior managers – in the water sector – would be required to cut the crap or be out on their ears.

Mr Navalny.

The death – murder ? – of Mr Navalny reminded us of the death of a very prominent opponent of the then Russian supremo Stalin,  Leon Trotsky in Mexico. 

To this day supporters of the views and policies of Trotsky are influential and raucous around the world. 

As I Please

For a variety of reasons my previous blog was substantially reduced in size.

Following a civilised discussion with my editor it was agreed that whilst he had sound reasons for abbreviating the draft submitted to him (Ed – because large chunks of it had been in the previous blog verbatim) an appendix would be added to Holdenforth to restore some of the omitted material.

One reason for the confusion – I challenge HF readers to write a coherent blog in the current national and international climate- an unseemly blend of chaos, corruption and mendacity.

Let’s see how we get on this time.

Slaughter in Gaza

Where does Holdenforth  stand on the most worrying issue of today – the conflict between Israel and Palestine – or, or many refer to it- the conflict between Israel and Hamas.

The media – official and social – are replete with details of the atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists in Israel.

For its part Israel has vowed to inflict retribution on those responsible.

“A STORY has no beginning or end; arbitrarily one chooses that moment of experience from which to look back or from which to look ahead”

From “The End of the Affair”  by Graham Greene

In the beginning

In Year 2 of the first world war – 1915 – Lloyd George, in his capacity as Minister of Munitions, was concerned about the acute shortage of explosives.

He contacted Professor Weizmann, an accomplished chemist, to explain the problem to him and to seek his help. Professor Weizmann  quickly  solved the problem and his achievement  was a most important contribution to the British war effort.

Lloyd George asked him how he, Lloyd George, might reward Weizmann for his work.

To quote Lloyd George – “Weizmann  explained his aspirations as to the repatriation  of the Jews to the sacred land they had made famous. When I became Prime Minister – in December, 1916, I talked the matter over with Mr Balfour – the outcome was the famous Balfour declaration in 1917.”

This declaration read:-

“His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

During the next  28 years the collective mind of the Jewish Diaspora was understandably pre-occupied with the murderous activities of Hitler in pursuit of his final solution of the Jewish problem.

“In Palestine there was irreconcilable conflict between Arabs and  Jews.”

English History 1914 to 1945 —– AJP Taylor

“The Balfour Declaration was abandoned after 20 years of attempting to reconcile the irreconcilable. It was no doubt unreasonable that the Arabs of Palestine should pay the whole price of what was a world problem, anti Semitism. On the other hand British Governments had made repeated promises to the Jews”

Extract from English History -AJP Taylor

In our time there is no shortage of extremely effective propaganda machines.

To illustrate the point the Israelis rightly and raucously highlight that Hamas is a terrorist organisation but they are quite reticent on the terrorist organisation that brought Israel to power, namely Irgun.

Other critics of Israel point out that the Balfour /Lloyd George declaration in 1917 was conceding land that was not theirs to dispose of. That consideration would not have weighed heavily with Lloyd George.

The Years 1945 to 1948 in Palestine

In post war Palestine the British Government attempted to maintain peace between Jewish immigrants and existing Palestinian communities.    This was not an easy task and the UK sought to relinquish the mandate.

One feature of this phase was the emergence of Irgun, a Zionist  group roughly equivalent to Hamas in Gaza today.

In the years from the end of WW2 to 1948 Irgun proved to be masters in using terror to secure their aims. Given the scale and severity of the terror the British Government of Mr Atlee wished to be relieved of the mandate.

The Irgun Group wrote the text book for terrorism that has been imitated around the world to this day.

It is ironic that the “terror”  tactics employed by Hamas are taken out of the Irgun textbook.

One terrorist activity of Irgun was to place a bomb in the King David Hotel in Jerusalem in the summer of 1946.This hotel housed the British Secretariat and Army HQ and almost 100 people were killed.

The public comments of senior British politicians about this appalling act of terrorism could serve as a template for the terms used to describe  Hamas today.

The universal hostile references in the UK – including the comments of the then Prime Minister, Mr Attlee, – to the terrorist activities of Irgun -can be accessed on the internet.

The State of Israel was established in the summer of 1948.

Events in Palestine since 1948  have seen years of the steady expansion of Israel at the expense of Palestine and others.

Israel continues to occupy and even extend illegal settlements, a point noted in the last 48 hours by Mr Gutierrez, the Secretary General of the UN despite the opposition of the United Nations.

“All the devouring and insatiate Monsters imagined since imagination could record itself are fused in the one realisation, Guillotine. And yet there is not in France, with its rich variety of soil and climate, a blade, a leaf, a root, a sprig, a pepper corn which will grow to maturity under conditions more certain than those that have produced this horror. Crush humanity out of shape once more and it will twist itself into the same tortured forms. Sow the same seed of rapacious license and oppression over again and it will surely the same fruit according to its kind.”

From “ A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens

In the above extract Dickens was making the simple point that the horrors of the French Revolution arose from the suppression of the people by the ruling class in previous years.

Thus – The French Revolution

Thus the emergence of Hamas

As I write possibly the most harrowing event now taking place anywhere in the world is the treatment by Israel of the 2 million inhabitants of Gaza, a tiny narrow strip of land – approximately 45 square kms to the south and west of Israel.

It is in this tiny area that Hamas operates and in which the October 7 attack was planned

In the 12 or so weeks that have elapsed since October 7 Israeli forces have inflicted huge casualties on the civilian population.

“Political language has to consist of euphemism, question begging and sheer cloudy  vagueness. Defenceless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets; this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers… “

From his essay -Politics and the English language –1946

HF considers that these words of Orwell accurately describe the current situation in Gaza.

Where does Holdenforth stand on the vexed question of illegal immigration?

* Many of the asylum seekers and refugees are simply seeking to do what you and I would do were we in their shoes – to improve the conditions of their lives.

* It could be argued – indeed it is argued by some – that the criminal gangs arranging illegal entry in small boats are simply exploiting a clear gap in the travel market – to provide a travel service to those seeking a better life.

* The UK authorities encourage the growth of this market opportunity by making available to those who succeed in landing on our  shores a significantly more agreeable life style.

*  Most of the venom of those in the Tory party anxious to demonstrate that they have a workable plan to tackle the problem is directed against small boats with their cargo of illegals.

* As I write there are around 2 million Palestinian civilians in Gaza being subjected to the sort of treatment and worse as described by  Orwell in the previous paragraph. Sooner or later someone will suggest that arrangements be made to allow these genuine asylum seekers and refugees to come to the UK possibly in very large boats – say a couple of Royal Caribbean  Cruise liners with each with capacities of at least 5000 thus getting around  the ban on small boats – what happens then?

Which of us would not gladly exchange life  in Gaza for a new life in the UK?

What about Brexit? .

The Brexit debate rumbles on. Very few now seek to argue that the UK should rejoin the EU.

The Labour MP for Torfaen -and the MP for Holdenforth –  Nick Thomas-Simmonds , has been handed the most formidable challenge of all in the Starmer shadow cabinet, that of reaching new arrangements with the EU short of full membership.

Mr Thomas – Simmonds has our full support in this Herculean assignment.

For all practical purposes – the UK is out of and will remain out of the EU for the next few years.

For HF that leaves a little unfinished business. Prior to the referendum in 2016 we had a modest wager with a rambling colleague about the outcome. We hoped fervently for a remain outlook – but we lost our preference and our wager. We hope to settle up before the Grim Reaper calls. 

Finally – a few HF slogans from previous blogs- slogans dear to our hearts and a few new issues that we will return to in future blogs.

Whither the BBC –  We will continue to campaign for the privatisation of the BBC.

We demand to know what is holding up the appearance in court of those responsible for the appalling miscarriage of justice in the persecution of sub postmasters.

Full credit to The Daily Mail for its vigorous campaign

HF is, if nothing else, a kindly blogger. We would be quite happy for The Rev Vennells to take her  CBE with her into Holloware were she to be convicted by a jury of her peers of criminal conduct.

While we are on the subject – we beg  HMG to abandon the languid Chilcot approach to interminably protracted public enquiries so beloved by senile judges and rapacious lawyers. We will open the bidding at a maximum duration of 3 months on any public enquiry.

When will the issue of who can work from home and in what circumstances be decided by management rather than by those languishing in the comfort of their own homes.

Let us widen this point – when will the management sector of our society be persuaded to do the job which it is paid to do. The public is constantly  assured that this is the reason  for the substantial reward packages paid to those in the sector.

Players and managers. HF was not surprised at the early departure from the management scene of Mr Rooney.

“Rooney on the scrap heap”

Daily Mail Jan 3 “

The Daily Mail piece noted the absurdity of the argument that the very best players in soccer are well placed to move into managerial positions.

The job of the manager/coach  is very different from that of the player.

How many more players will be quickly humiliated when they “move into management” before this obvious outcome is appreciated.

The Mones V HMG

“WE have been hung out to dry on PPE, the Mones moan”

Daily Mail Jan 2

Holdenforth noted that The Mones were fighting back after the initial setback of Lady Mone admitted telling porkies to an interviewer.  As one might expect the facts as opposed to the gossip are not easy to come by but the gist of the defence now being put forward by “lying Baroness Bra” (soubriquet courtesy of doughty Mail reporter Guy Adams) and her husband Mr Barrowman is that they followed the rules laid down by HMG at all times.

More to the point – this issue will not be on the Pandemic enquiry for over a year.

HF thinks that the Mones have a point.

Dead Souls

“How ghost patients have boosted GP coffers by £955m”

Daily Mail- Jan 2

“ GP surgeries are being paid millions of pounds a year for patients who do not exist, figures show”

Nice work if you can get it ,.

Even better if you can get it for not working.

The business model for this imaginative venture was described by Nicolai Gogol in his novel “Dead Souls” published almost 200 years ago in Russia. The hero of the novel, Tchitckoff, bought the souls of serfs who had died between one census and the next. He used these dead souls as raise cash.

There have been one or two changes in the past 200 years but you can see the similarities.

A word about Mark Almond, the  crusading campaigning columnist – and the director of the Oxford Crisis Research Institute.

“Make no mistake, this escalating crisis in the Red Sea could prove to be America’s Suez”

Mark Almond, Daily Mail, Jan 2

Mr Almond details the substantial hazard that has been added to the problems faced by the West in The Ukraine and in Gaza, namely the problem of keeping the Suez Canal open for business as usual. After reading his column it is not easy to think that 2024 will bring about any easing of international tension.   

Charity queen with a colourful life dies aged 61

The charity queen in question was Camila Batmanghelidjh who rose to national prominence some 20 years ago. The charity she founded and helped to manage was Kids’ Company.

The charity raised huge sums of money to provide support for young people suffering from abuse, poverty and trauma, all worthy causes. However unkind critics of the charity felt that Camila was enjoying an expensive lifestyle funded by the charity although a  lengthy and costly High Court case exonerated her of mismanaging the charity or its funds.

The lesson here – it is not easy for charity commissioners to ensure that monies raised for charity always find their way to the intended recipients.

Finally – a memory test.

HF vaguely recalls that Kate Bingham was thought to have done a good job during the CV pandemic whilst Dido Harding was deemed to have turned in a shaky performance – or is it the other way round.

So – Holdenforth memo to Lady Hallett – chair of the pandemic enquiry – get a move on – we demand to see your report by the end of March, 2024 – repeat end of March, 2024.