January 2013
 |
Assorted Online Comments
- January 2013 |
To Top of index
| July 2013
“” |
|
Assorted Online Comments
- July 2013
I made comments online during
July 2013 in response to (inter alia) the following articles:
|
“Inquiry
needed to compel congregations to reveal truth about treatment of
Magdalenes”, Irish Times, 24th July
| |
|
“Drastic
action needed to tackle growing food poverty”, Irish Times, 23rd
July
|
|
“Abortion
couple ‘felt abandoned’ by health system”, Irish Times, 23rd
July |
| May 2013 |
Too dense for sense
[P!]
Letter
published [£] in the Sunday Times on 16th May
A student's science workbook from 2002 asks
“Which would you think is heavier, ice or
water?”
(“Give more credit to parents who suffer most”, Comment, last
week). The comparative adjective should be
“denser” not
“heavier”
But here is the original text,
complete with the edited-out sarcasm:
Brenda Power unearths a student
workbook from 2002, Look Around (Third Class): Science and Environmental
Studies, in which the question
“Which
would you think is heavier, ice or water?”
has been left unanswered (Give more credit to parents who suffer most,
May 12th).
Her child deserves utmost credit
for treating this question with the contempt it deserves, because it is
an unanswerable disgrace in a science paper. The comparative adjective
should be "“denser”
not
“heavier”.
Is the Department of Education educated?
To Top of index |
|
Assorted Online Comments
- May 2013
I made comments online during
May 2013 in response to (inter alia) the following articles:
|
“Under-fire
Obama should drop the wistful, petulant approach”, Irish Times, 20th May
| |
|
“‘No
question of time limit’ for abortion, junior minister claims”,
Irish Times, 4th May |
|
“The
coming Arab Winter”, The Commentator, 1st May
|
To Top of index
| April 2013
“” |
|
Assorted Online Comments
- April 2013
I made comments online during
April 2013 in response to (inter alia) the following articles:
|
“Dublin
bedsit blitz finds over 90% of flats do not meet basic standards”, Irish Times,
26th April | |
|
“US
media storm over murder trial of abortionist Kermit Gosnell”,
Irish Times, 20th April |
|
“Sayonara
baby, our marriage is a sham”, Irish Times, 16th April |
|
“The
Kermit Gosnell case confirms that late-term abortion can amount to
legalised infanticide”, The Telegraph, 13th April |
|
“Don’t
be fooled by the spring snows, they are further proof of global warming”,
Irish Times, 1st April |
To Top of index
| March 2013 |
|
Assorted Online Comments
- March 2013 I made comments online during
February 2013 in response to (inter alia) the following articles:
|
“How
age twists leftish youth into raving right-wing bigots”,
Irish Times, 31st March | |
|
“Surrogacy
is a legal and ethical minefield and must be banned”, Irish Times,
9th March |
|
“Israel
battles plague of locusts”, Irish Times,
6th March |
|
“Klaus
Bows Out”, Irish Times,
5th March |
|
“An
Irishman's Diary”, Irish Times,
4th March |
To Top of index
| February 2013 |
Cost of Corrib Protests
[P!]
Letter to the Irish Times,
published on 6th February
Sir, / The report in your newspaper on the latest protests
over Shell’s development of the Corrib gas field that “the cost of
developing the Corrib gas field could be four times the initial estimate of
€800 million at more than €3 billion” (“Activists
hold Shell protest”, Home News, February 2nd). Simultaneously, the
project timetable has trebled from four years (delivery in 2007) to 12
(2015).
These overruns are due overwhelmingly to the protests against a project that
was and is proceeding in full compliance with the democratic law of the
land. The protesters do not like the law (which is their right), yet while
the Garda has done its best to uphold the law and allow the project to
proceed, it lacked the support of the political class who failed in their
duty to defend the law. So the protests have been allowed to dictate the
pace and nature of the project.
People may not be aware, however, that the massive cost overrun and delay
have deprived Irish taxpayers of an enormous amount of revenue. Because
Corrib’s 25 per cent corporation tax will be payable only after the project
has recovered its (fourfold increased) cost, a process which can begin only
when the gas starts to flow (eight years late), the tax take will have been
destroyed to the tune of at least 75 per cent on a net present value basis,
compared to the original plan. It is ironic that the protesters object that
25 per cent corporation tax is insufficient revenue for the State.
Nevertheless, that 75 per cent tax destruction is the burden that the
protesters have placed on this bankrupt country. Their continued protests,
which no-one now pretends are going to succeed in moving the processing
plant offshore, are potentially destroying even more tax revenues. For no
gain. / Yours, etc
Note:
Shell-to-Sea, the main body which campaigns against the Corrib project,
kindly transcribed my letter
here. What they say about me personally is broadly correct.
But irrelevant. The facts are the facts. This is the chart
behind my letter, prepared for a post in 2012,
“Troubling
Trebling of Corrib Costs Irish Taxpayers 75%”.
Reply in the Irish Times on 11th February 20113
Sir, – Tony Allwright (February 6th) blames protesters
for denying the exchequer tax revenue from the Corrib Gas project. This
blame is misdirected. The project has been delayed because Shell,
encouraged by successive governments, believed it could save money by
imposing an experimental inland refinery on an isolated rural community.
If you force a dangerous project on people, you can’t blame them for the
delays that result from their opposition to it. When An Bord Pleanála
examined the evidence in 2009, it agreed that the pipeline carrying raw
gas to this refinery posed an “unacceptable” safety risk to local
residents.
The long delays and huge cost over-runs could have been avoided, had the
company not tried to make smaller savings by cutting corners at the
start.
Using Mr Allwright’s logic, we could blame the Carnsore anti-nuclear
protests of the 1970s for depriving Ireland of cheap electricity and tax
revenue. And think of the jobs local people might still be enjoying at
the nuclear power plant! – Yours, etc,
WILLIAM HEDERMAN,
Portmahon Drive,
Rialto,
Dublin 8.
To Top of index |
|
Assorted Online Comments
- February 2013 I made comments online during
February 2013 in response to (inter alia) the following articles:
|
“Political
reality stymies action on climate change'”, Irish Times,
26th Feb | |
|
“Law
must enshrine child's right to birth information'”, Irish Times,
21st Feb |
|
“Raising
the minimum wage would be good economics'”, Irish Times,
19th Feb |
|
“No
equal right to life if law embraces suicide risk'”, Irish Times,
15th Feb |
|
“Ending
world hunger must be presidency's goal'”, Irish Times,
7th February |
|
“Imagine
the debate if liberals opposed abortion'”, Irish Times,
1st February |
To Top of index
| January 2013 |
|
Assorted Online Comments
- January 2013 I made comments online during
January 2013 in response to (inter alia) the following articles/threads:
|
“Cameron
stance bad news for Britain and Europe'”, Irish Times,
24th January | |
|
“State
to adopt 'social clauses''”, Irish Times,
24th January |
|
“Psychiatrists
alone should apply abortion suicide 'test'”, Irish Times,
18th January |
|
“EU
referendum plan a high-risk endgame for UK”, Irish Times,
18th January |
|
“Obama
takes up gun control”, Irish Times,
16th January |
|
“Equal
right to life of the unborn is a nonsense”, Irish Times,
16th January |
|
“Divisive
abortion debate requires responsible society to show tolerance”, Irish Times,
8th January |
|
“A
national pensions crisis”, Irish Times, 7th January
|
|
“Angela
Merkel is not working - for EU or Berlin”, Irish Times, 7th January
|
|
“…making
a list, checking it twice, gonna find out who’s naughty or right”,
Cedar Lounge Revolution,
2nd January 2013
|
To Top of index
“”
‘’
|
|
won by New Zealand |
|
Gift Idea
Cuddly Teddy Bears
looking for a home
Click for details
“” |
|
Neda Agha Soltan;
shot dead in Teheran
by Basij militia |
Good to report that as at
14th September 2009
he is at least
alive.
FREED AT LAST,
ON 18th OCTOBER 2011,
GAUNT BUT OTHERWISE REASONABLY HEALTHY |
|
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|
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|
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Discover the
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My Columns in the
|
|
What I've recently
been reading
“The Lemon Tree”, by Sandy
Tol (2006),
is a delightful novel-style history of modern Israel and Palestine told
through the eyes of a thoughtful protagonist from either side, with a
household lemon tree as their unifying theme.
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
+++++
This examines events which led to BP's 2010 Macondo blowout in
the Gulf of Mexico.
BP's ambitious CEO John Browne expanded BP 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
in
May,
June, and
July 2010
+++++
A horrific account
of:
|
how the death
penalty is administered and, er, executed in Singapore,
|
|
the corruption of
Singapore's legal system, and |
|
Singapore's
enthusiastic embrace of Burma's drug-fuelled military dictatorship |
More details on my
blog
here.
+++++
This is
nonagenarian Alistair Urquhart’s
incredible story of survival in the Far
East during World War II.
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,
|
part of a death march to Thailand,
|
|
a slave labourer on the Siam/Burma
railway (one man died for every sleeper laid), |
|
regularly beaten and tortured,
|
|
racked by starvation, gaping ulcers
and disease including cholera, |
|
a slave labourer stevedoring at
Singapore’s docks, |
|
shipped to Japan in a stinking,
closed, airless hold with 900 other sick and dying men,
|
|
torpedoed by the Americans and left
drifting alone for five days before being picked up, |
|
a slave-labourer in Nagasaki until
blessed liberation thanks to the Americans’ “Fat Boy” atomic
bomb. |
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.
+++++
“Culture of Corruption:
Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Cronies”
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.
+++++
This much trumpeted sequel to
Freakonomics is a bit of disappointment.
It is really just
a collation of amusing
little tales about surprising human (and occasionally animal) behaviour
and situations. For example:
|
Drunk walking kills more people per
kilometer than drunk driving. |
|
People aren't really altruistic -
they always expect a return of some sort for good deeds. |
|
Child seats are a waste of money as
they are no safer for children than adult seatbelts. |
|
Though doctors have known for
centuries they must wash their hands to avoid spreading infection,
they still often fail to do so. |
|
Monkeys can be taught to use washers
as cash to buy tit-bits - and even sex. |
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.
++++++
A remarkable, coherent attempt by Financial Times economist Alan Beattie
to understand and explain world history through the prism of economics.
It's chapters are
organised around provocative questions such as
|
Why does asparagus come from Peru? |
|
Why are pandas so useless? |
|
Why are oil and diamonds more trouble
than they are worth? |
|
Why doesn't Africa grow cocaine? |
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:
|
Argentina protects its now largely
foreign landowners (eg George Soros) |
|
Russia its military-owned
businesses, such as counterfeit DVDs |
|
The US its cotton industry
comprising only 1% of GDP and 2% of its workforce |
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.
+++++
This is a thrilling book of derring-do behind enemy lines in the jungles
of north-east Burma in 1942-44 during the Japanese occupation.
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 |
|
Won by New Zealand |
|
Won by New Zealand |
|
Click for an account of this momentous,
high-speed event
of March 2009
Won by Wales |
|
Click on the logo
to get a table with
the Rugby World Cup
scores, points and rankings.
After
48
crackling, compelling, captivating games, the new World Champions are,
deservedly,
SOUTH AFRICA
England get the Silver,
Argentina the Bronze. Fourth is host nation France.
No-one can argue with
the justice of the outcomes
Over the competition,
the average
points per game = 52,
tries per game = 6.2,
minutes per try =
13 |
|
Click on the logo
to get a table with
the final World Cup
scores, points, rankings and goal-statistics |
|
 |
|
