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TALLRITE BLOG You can write to me at blog2-at-tallrite-dot-com |
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“Ill-informed and
objectionable”;
“You poisonous, bigoted, ignorant, verbose little wa*ker.” (except I'm not little - 1.97m) Reader comments |
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Myspace Clocks, Video Clocks, Flash Clocks, Fun Clocks at WishAFriend.com |
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ISSUE #212 - March 2011 [482+3233=3715] |
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Daily poll on President Obama’s
popularity; date is
on the charts.
(Click to get the latest version.)
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Madness of Voluntary Redundancy
Implementing redundancies on a voluntary basis Most of the Western world, with some commendable exceptions such as Australia and Canada, is experiencing the worst economic downturn in a generation. For some, such as Ireland, Iceland, Portugal, Greece, it is probably the worst in its history. (Well, maybe not Greece since its history stretches back at least 3,000 years, during which anything could have have already happened, and probably did.) Confidence has evaporated, customers are disappearing, businesses are closing, people are losing their jobs, and meanwhile the state is spending money faster than it can be collected from the remaining taxpayers and functioning businesses. The resulting deficit - the difference between expenditure and tax collection - must be met by borrowing. This is another way of saying that future generations - today's primary schoolchildren, kindergarten toddlers, foetuses, the yet unconceived - are condemned by the feckless adults of today to work and pay until their old age to pay off their elders' debts, a thoroughly disreputable practice by those elders akin to child abuse. Since its housing bubble began to deflate in March 2007, Ireland's budget surplus, hitherto swollen by housing stamp duties, has, according to its Department of Finance, turned into an ever-increasing deficit. This rose to an eye-watering €12.6 billion (or €2,700 per man, woman and child) during last year:
The huge chasm between tax receipts and expenditure (27% of expenditure in 2010) will never be resolved until public spending is cut drastically. It is fanciful to suppose, despite what politicians aver to the contrary, that increased taxes (of the rich, of corporations, of anyone) will ever come close to closing the gap, as all this will do is discourage enterprise, constrain profits and hence reduce not increase the net tax take. But taking the knife to public activity is excruciatingly painful for the political masters of the civil service (equally so for bosses in the private sector but there is much less indulgence in the luxury of hand-wringing). Fiddling at the edges, like restricting overtime, reducing outside contracts, cutting back on coffee and biscuits, doesn't hurt too much, but makes no substantive difference. In Ireland, which is probably typical of Western countries, some 80%** of public expenditure goes on the emoluments and benefits of its 359,000 civil servants (16% of Ireland's 2.2m workforce, up from 11% in 2002). Therefore, the abyss can be tackled only through knocking a quarter off the wage bill, which perforce means cutting both salaries and large numbers of jobs, including those of the so-called front-line services - nurses, teachers, policemen etc. This will cause the public to suffer, which is regrettable, but it is also inevitable and to pretend that the front-line will be kept somehow immune is both ridiculous and dishonest.
Moreover, in the past two years, Ireland's GDP has shrunk by 10% in real terms from $190 to $172 billion while unemployment has grown from 4.8% to 14.7%. Nearly all of the layoffs have fallen on the private sector where thousands of the immigrant unemployed have returned home and indigenous unemployed gone on the dole or emigrated. Yet in the public sector, of all those
not a single one has been laid off. How are the necessary manpower reductions to be achieved? The mantra in Ireland, and not just in the bloated public sector, is voluntary redundancy. From the viewpoint of both politicians and immediate supervisors that's a nice, warm, friendly way to shed staff. As well as normal retirees, anyone who wants to can take the (hopefully generous) package and go, without being replaced. From the viewpoint of running any enterprise, however, it is a policy disaster, quite apart from the fact that it cannot possibly yield the huge numbers of staff reductions needed. When a voluntary redundancy scheme is offered,
So you accomplish exactly the opposite of what you need. You're left with all the non-performers at a time when, precisely because you've lost your high-achieving staff, the work load on those who remain has disproportionately increased. The work of one high-flyer probably requires two or more low-flyers, whereas if a low-flyer leaves, a high-flyer can probably take on his/her tasks with relative ease. Not forcing people to leave when you need to reduce your headcount might make you feel warm, but it's madness. The purpose of an employer in any business is to achieve business results (and pay its taxes), not to run a social service for people who are unable make the same level of contribution as others. All redundancies should therefore be compulsory - but compassionate. By that I mean the employer needs to target its weakest performers, explain that their past work is highly appreciated even though the business no longer requires their services, and offer them the generous package, together with assistance in finding new work, in exchange for agreeing to go quietly. Failure to accept the package would ultimately mean redundancy anyway, but with only statutory payments. In practice, few will want to try the confrontational route. Moreover, it will be surprising how many seemingly “unemployable” people in fact become employable when they are actually confronted with the challenge of finding a new job. “Natural wastage” is the other way that employers make themselves feel warm when they need to reduce staff. You simply refrain from hiring replacements for people who are quitting anyway, typically retirees. The problem here is that not only are the cuts achieved over a necessarily prolonged period, as you wait for people to reach retirement age, but it distorts your future age profile. All those bright youngsters you didn't hire will constitute a missing cohort of expertise, experience and succession in the decades ahead, for which the business will ultimately pay a heavy price. In summary, if staff numbers must be cut, whether to secure the survival of the business or simply because - in for example an economy like Ireland's with a massive budget deficit - the cash is simply not there to pay them, there is never a rational case for implementing the redundancies on a voluntary basis. The concept of voluntary redundancy is deeply unserious; it is madness.
Palestinian Depravity Unbounded
Stabbing to death babies and children in their
beds The Fogels were a young family with six children, who lived at the Itamar settlement near the West Bank city of Nablus. On 11th March two Palestinians from the village of Awarta broke into their house and without provocation used knives to murder:
Can you imagine the trauma then suffered by their twelve-year old daughter Tamar when she returned home only to find the five bodies of her family, plus two other wounded siblings whom she rescued?
Meanwhile sweets are offered around to Hamas policemen and others in the streets of the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah to celebrate the quintuple murder of five Jews.
Palestinian depravity knows no bounds. Words fail me. Words also fail me when I view this recent interview with Tamar Fogel, the 12-year-old daughter who discovered her family slaughtered at home. When you think about the trauma she endured just a week earlier, her maturity, overall dignity and lack of rancour are truly inspiring. Even the family's eviction by the Israeli authorities from their home in Gaza in 2005 elicits no bitterness: her parents told her we will not fight against our brothers, the soldiers. She is truly a remarkable young woman.
Joyously Surfing Japan's Tsunami of Suffering Some people place their own vanity far above the suffering of others  John Vidal is the Guardian's Environmental Editor with a history of fashionable left-wing anti causes (McDonalds burgers, “anti-war” <ie the usual pro-Jihad>, Western oil companies, global warm-mongering etc). He is also someone whose liberal outlook extends to telling his personal version of the truth (for example, “oil is the dirtiest industry in the world” - no it's not. Coal, for one, is dirtier). One of his conventional pet-hates is clearly nuclear power for which he has the aversion shared by all such bien-pensants. This vain man recently wrote a preposterous piece of propaganda in the Irish Times, in which he delights in the horrors of Japan's misery because it affords him an opportunity to push his anti-nuclear prejudices by inventing scare-mongering fictions. Just as a little urine ruins an entire bottle of wine, so his wilful fabrications - which are not little - ruin any merit his article might otherwise contain.
This charlatan is joyously surfing Japan's tsunami of suffering. As such, he is a sadist as well as a mountebank.
Another Foreign Invasion - Yawn
In the age of no-George-Bush,
At last someone shows the way - and well ahead of the
Libyan no-fly zone. Yet on the use of force by the West, and in the light of the Libyan hostilities, many maintain that the imposition of military action today requires some form of consensus. This is nonsense, as Saudi Arabia has shown in Bahrein. Provided the arms are available, the only essential ingredient is simple will. For example, Egypt could have gone in and attacked and killed Qadaffi at any time; it would take only days or a few weeks. So could America, France, the UK, together or singly, and without anyone's say-so if their leaders only had the will. Who would stop them? Russia? China? Iran? Yeah, right! Yet even now, in the heat of the no-fly-zone, there is no will, either singly or collectively, to remove the essence of Libya's command-and-control-system - the supreme leader himself. Why? Because the UN Security Resolution 1973 has given its permission only for military activities that specifically eschew boots-on-the ground, and it is considered non-cricket to bomb Q'Daffy's palaces until he's dead. Collateral civilian deaths from bombing other more militaristic targets are, on the other hand, perfectly acceptable if regrettable. There is also the mistaken belief that such an invader, having once accomplished a specified task (such as removing or killing a leader) would have to stay and rebuild the country á la Iraq. More nonsense. If it wants it can just go in, do the job and get out. Let the Libyans do their own damn rebuilding.
Catholic Coffee Morning in Rome Oh my God, the clergy have been trumped Four Catholic men and a Catholic woman were having coffee in St Peters Square in Rome.
Since the lone Catholic woman was sipping her coffee in silence, The four men give her a subtle, “Well....?” She proudly replies, “I have a daughter, SLIM ... TALL ... BLONDE ... 38D BUST ... 24” WAIST ... 34” HIPS.
When she walks into a room, people just gasp and say, “Oh My God!”. Hat tip: Mary Gleeson
Issue 212’s Comments to Cyberspace
- - - - - L I B Y A - - - - - Quote: “To our son, His Excellency, Mr Barack Hussein Obama. I have said to you before, that even if Libya and the United States of America enter into a war, god forbid, you will always remain a son.” Q'Daffy plays googie-goo with O'Barmy. And another mystery is solved.
We all know the US president wasn't born in
America. Quote: “ They love me, all my people with me, they love me all ... They will die to protect me, my people.”Colonel Gadaffi explains why there is no revolution going on in his country.
Moreover, he has quite reasonably asked why,
and from what position,
Quote: “We want logistical foreign intervention, air
embargoes, bombardments of air bases, Muftah Queidir, a lawyer close to Benghazi's governing coalition, makes clear what is needed to rid the Libyan people of their brutal dictator and his vile sons. Funny how George W Bush's Iraq policy is suddenly beginning to look attractive. - - - - - O B A M A - - - - - Quote and Quote: “Do as you’re told” and “It would be so much easier to be President of China ... No one is scrutinizing Hu Jintao’s words in Tahrir Square”.
President Obama displays his frustration Quote: “The strange shrunken spectator who serves as president of the United States.” Mark Steyn's take on America's president.
As he caustically remarks, Quote: “I guess this will be the big story of the day: I’m coming over. And I’m coming in May.” President Obama threatens Ireland with a visit
I look forward to the placards at the protest
marches
Quote: “The most dangerous place for an African American is in the womb.”
New York billboard, taken down
Evidently the truth hurts As Dr Johnny Hunter,
See my post “Abortion as Genocidal Sexism and Racism” of a year ago. - - - - - U K - - - - - Quote: “Yeah, I suppose I am. I forgot about that. I'm holding the fort but I'm hoping to take the end of the week off with my kids. Someone else will have to do it then. It sounds more haphazard than it probably is.”
Nick Clegg, Britain's deputy prime minister,
Mr Clegg was skiing with this family in Switzerland at the time.
You can tell these clowns have never worked - - - - - I R E L A N D - - - - - Quote: “Mel Gibson booked on battery charge.” A curious headline in the Irish Independent on St Patrick's Day.
What kind of whizz-bank ePhone is Mr Gibson
using Quote: “I hope that the irony will not be lost upon you that I stand here, on my evening of defeat, in a hall – this magnificent sports complex – which I helped to build.”
John O'Donohue, member of the
He also used his official positions to shovel
taxpayers money He was speaking from one such Kerry white elephant.
This venal man was especially notorious
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communication centers and
supervision of the coasts.”
Now, for a little [Light Relief]
“”
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Gift Idea |
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Good to report that as at
FREED AT LAST, |
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BLOGROLL
Atlantic Blog (defunct) Blog-Irish (defunct)
Jihad
Religion
Iona Institute
Leisure
Blog Directory
My Columns in the
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What I've recently
But it's not
entirely honest in its subtle pro-Palestinian bias, and therefore needs
to be read in conjunction with an antidote, such as See detailed review +++++
BP's ambitious CEO John Browne expanded it through adventurous acquisitions, aggressive offshore exploration, and relentless cost-reduction that trumped everything else, even safety and long-term technical sustainability. Thus mistakes accumulated, leading to terrifying and deadly accidents in refineries, pipelines and offshore operations, and business disaster in Russia. The Macondo blowout was but an inevitable outcome of a BP culture that had become poisonous and incompetent. However the book is gravely compromised by a litany of over 40 technical and stupid errors that display the author's ignorance and carelessness. It would be better to wait for the second (properly edited) edition before buying. As for BP, only a wholesale rebuilding of a new, professional, ethical culture will prevent further such tragedies and the eventual destruction of a once mighty corporation with a long and generally honourable history. Note: I wrote
my own reports on Macondo +++++
A horrific account of:
More details on my blog here. +++++
After recounting a childhood of convention and simple pleasures in working-class Aberdeen, Mr Urquhart is conscripted within days of Chamberlain declaring war on Germany in 1939. From then until the Japanese are deservedly nuked into surrendering six years later, Mr Urquhart’s tale is one of first discomfort but then following the fall of Singapore of ever-increasing, unmitigated horror. After a wretched journey Eastward, he finds himself part of Singapore’s big but useless garrison. Taken prisoner when Singapore falls in 1941, he is, successively,
Chronically ill, distraught and traumatised on return to Aberdeen yet disdained by the British Army, he slowly reconstructs a life. Only in his late 80s is he able finally to recount his dreadful experiences in this unputdownable book. There are very few first-person eye-witness accounts of the the horrors of Japanese brutality during WW2. As such this book is an invaluable historical document. +++++
This is a rattling good tale of the web of corruption within which the American president and his cronies operate. It's written by blogger Michele Malkin who, because she's both a woman and half-Asian, is curiously immune to the charges of racism and sexism this book would provoke if written by a typical Republican WASP. With 75 page of notes to back up - in best blogger tradition - every shocking and in most cases money-grubbing allegation, she excoriates one Obama crony after another, starting with the incumbent himself and his equally tricky wife. Joe Biden, Rahm Emmanuel, Valerie Jarett, Tim Geithner, Lawrence Summers, Steven Rattner, both Clintons, Chris Dodd: they all star as crooks in this venomous but credible book. ACORN, Mr Obama's favourite community organising outfit, is also exposed for the crooked vote-rigging machine it is. +++++
It is really just a collation of amusing little tales about surprising human (and occasionally animal) behaviour and situations. For example:
The book has no real message other than don't be surprised how humans sometimes behave and try to look for simple rather than complex solutions. And with a final anecdote (monkeys, cash and sex), the book suddenly just stops dead in its tracks. Weird. ++++++
It's chapters are organised around provocative questions such as
It's central thesis is that economic development continues to be impeded in different countries for different historical reasons, even when the original rationale for those impediments no longer obtains. For instance:
The author writes in a very chatty, light-hearted matter which makes the book easy to digest. However it would benefit from a few charts to illustrate some of the many quantitative points put forward, as well as sub-chaptering every few pages to provide natural break-points for the reader. +++++
The author was a member of Britain's V Force, a forerunner of the SAS. Its remit was to harass Japanese lines of command, patrol their occupied territory, carryout sabotage and provide intelligence, with the overall objective of keeping the enemy out of India. Irwin is admirably yet brutally frank, in his descriptions of deathly battles with the Japs, his execution of a prisoner, dodging falling bags of rice dropped by the RAF, or collapsing in floods of tears through accumulated stress, fear and loneliness. He also provides some fascinating insights into the mentality of Japanese soldiery and why it failed against the flexibility and devolved authority of the British. The book amounts to a very human and exhilarating tale. Oh, and Irwin describes the death in 1943 of his colleague my uncle, Major PF Brennan. +++++ Other books here |
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After
48
crackling, compelling, captivating games, the new World Champions are,
deservedly,
England get the Silver,
No-one can argue with
Over the competition, |
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