Ed Dowding

Too damned right. Have a listen to Marcus Brigstocke on Post Offices. In comedia veritas.

Just in case you’ve not seen it yet

More inspirational and wise words from the only politician of my lifetime who I believe in.

I think you can probably bet your bank details that the following would not happen if your details were breached on the forthcoming UK ID card

US Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton has said her passport file was improperly accessed by officials at the state department.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice contacted Mrs Clinton about the breach, Mrs Clinton’s senate office said.

It comes Ms Rice apologised to Mrs Clinton’s Democratic presidential rival Barack Obama over a breach of his passport records.

Two state department contractors have been fired and a third disciplined.

BBC

Well, well, well… guess what? UK’s MI5 Wants Oyster Card Travel Data

I realised today that I doubt the good forecasts but believe the bad ones. That possibly says deep things about my personality.

Sigh. Another folly masquerading as change.

People just do not respond well to being pushed. We take pride in our (country’s) actions where they are noble, moral, well thought through, and demonstrably good.

It is the quality of our (government’s / organisations’) daily actions which has the ability to nurture pride within us. This, it might be suggested, is counterproductive to the very cause it intends to champion.

Please vote wisely next time around.

My answer to this question:

The best article I’ve seen on this is http://www.changethis.com/38.03.EdInnovation, followed closely by another from the IEA arguing for the economic liberatlisation of education and removing it from Government control / state monopoly.

It certainly seems very true that innovation in education will come from countries like India and China who face the challenge of educating huge numbers. It is likely that the internet will play a large role in this so that the greatest teachers can teach hundreds of thousands of students. See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/4365350.stm for an example.

We also need more flexibility in WHAT we encourage learning in (note the change from passive ‘teach’ to active ‘learn’), since we at the moment we inculcate a struggle for the ‘top’, rather than contentment with a simpler life. (The ‘life and music’ animation http://www.souljerky.com/articles/south_park_zen_alan_watts_trey.html is a great demonstration of this problem).

Whilst I don’t entirely agree with complete liberalisation (since if the government is to be responsible for its citizens later on (social security), it should also be allowed to ensure they are capable of earning a living, so some for of regulation would be required.

“Our dealings with those whom we love may be safely left to instinct; it is our dealings with those whom we hate that ought to be brought under the dominion of reason. In the modern world, those whom we effevtively hate are distant groups, especially foreign nations. We conceive them abstractly, and deceive ourselves into the belief that acts which are really embodiments of  hatred are done from love of justice or some such lofty motive. Only a large measure of scepticism can rear away the veils which hide this truth from us. Having achieved that, we could begin to build a new morality, not based on envy and restriction, but on the wish for a full life and the realisation that other human beings are a help and not a hindrance when once the madness of envy has been cured. This is not a Utopian hope; it was partially realised in Elizabethan England. It could be realised tomorrow if men would learn to pursue their own happiness rather than the miser of others. This is no impossibly austere morality, yet its adoption would turn our earth into a paradise.”

When you talk, there are times when you might raise the pitch of your voice to give the word emphasis.

Instead, you can sound like an important person in a suit by simply lowering it on the same word.

Try it: “I don’t *really* think that’s a good idea” vs “I don’t _really_ think that’s a good idea”.