Of Paper and Tablets

There are so many reasons why the procurement of tablets for TDs in order to save money on paper is a stupid, idiotic idea, I thought it would have been facetious to actually give it any thought.  Then, on the News at One, Oireachtas head of Communications Mark Mulqueen comes on the radio and says that it will save money in the long term, as part of a move towards "the paperless office".

The Real European Economy

The austerity that is sweeping Europe is being broadly - if barely - accepted is being accepted because there is some sense that there have been excesses that need to be rectified.  While there have concurrently been imbalances, and not all sectors of society have benefited, there is a socialised acceptance that some kind of redress needs to happen.  In Germany, it was a little different.  There has been sustained economic growth, budget surpluses, and general contentment; but it has been growth of a different kind from that of the post-war period.  While in the post-war period the boom was based on reconstruction, this time Germany has generated wealth through prudent economics, but it has invested that wealth abroad.

RTE and The Future of TV

Last night's love-in with RTE was a classic wolf in sheep's clothing.  RTE decided to make a programme about television and its future, as part of the fiftieth anniversary programme, that was in effect an egregious, dishonest use of the license fee to defend the license fee itself.  There was no real analysis of other markets and how they operate, because almost all of them operate differently to Ireland; some operate on a license fee without ads (Germany, France), while others operate on ads with no license fee (USA - though PBS is a specifically and exclusively federally funded organisation).  RTE takes both, and screws up at both.  For ad based content, you need to compete against other commercial channels - RTE's viewing figures have been steadily falling over the years.  For license fee driven content, you need to advance the cultural and political objectives of the state: within the last twelve months, the monstrous treatment of Fr Kevin Reynolds, TweetGate and Sean Gallagher, were swiftly followed by the shutting of the London office of RTE.

Positive Public Service

Romantic Ireland's Dead and Gone,
It's with Whitaker in Retirement

Tom Geraghty's myopic and formulaic defence of the public sector in today's Irish Times made me mad again, but not for the usual reasons.  The gap between public sector and private sector average wages was ignored (50% according the the CSO, see page 2), and of course private sector unemployment and emigration was not considered.  It's nothing new, we've seen this kind of trade union bluster before, and I won't waste any more electrons on that here.

Monbiot and Python: Brothers in Arms

Scary corporate men coming to get you!

“We can state with conviction, therefore, that a man's support for absolute government is in direct proportion to the contempt he feels for his country.” 
― Alexis de Tocqueville

George Monbiot is a man of passion.  He is one of the people who - in my mid twenties - helped me to see past the orthodoxy of western liberalism, and actually question the righteousness of the establishment.  That was a good thing.  But I moved on.  As quickly as I understood that the establishment needed to be questioned, I understood the importance of perspective; that being outside the establishment made it difficult to see in, just as it was often painfully difficult for those within the establishment to see out.

The GAA is an Anachronism

I've always loved Championship Sundays in the summer.  It reminds me of days on the beach, with water too cold to swim in, cola flavoured Mr Freeze, and frenetic half-Irish commentary on the battery powered radio.  These days, much older and far too wise for the folly of an Irish beach, I am afraid to say that the GAA has lost its relevance.

Tin Foil Hat: The State Monitoring Regime

As we meander our sorry way out of the mess of debt and poor tax policy, there are dozens of programmes underway to restructure the economy, and reset the expectations of a citizenry that chose not to be too critical while the gravy was flowing.  The tax base is being broadened, services are being cut, excess is being eliminated, and the perpetual dance between the politicians and the mandarins continues at a pace that would have brought a wry smile to the face of Antony Jay, or of Jonathan Lynn.
Amongst the measures being introduced are the household charge / property tax, along with water metering. The ESB meanwhile is busy rolling out smart meters, which can do much more than simply measure energy consumption, they can broadcast energy readings back to base, obviating the need for meter readers (or notes from readers saying that they called but no one was in, when I was in).  They can also, ultimately, get down to an appliance level and monitor and optimise consumption, theoretically allowing you to put on the kettle from a mile away, or turning on security lights from the other side of the world.

Interpreting the Children's Rights Amendment

There are five key phrases that are likely to be open to wide-ranging interpretation in the proposed amendment to the Constitution, and likely to forum the nucleus of the upcoming debate:

1. "any of their children"
Clause 2 1° says in essence that the state can take over the role of the parents if they are bad parents.  However, this is a point of vagueness in relation to the parents of multiple children.  It could be interpreted that if a judgement is made that parents of multiple children are deemed bad to one of their children, then the state can legitimately supplant the parenting of all of the children.  This is difficult in a conventional family, but in an unconventional family, for example where there are two or more fathers of children of one mother, it makes interpretation almost impossible.  It should be changed to simply say "a child", rather than "any of their children".

2. "is likely to be prejudicially affected"
This represents a judgement that the extent to which parents are failing in their duties is objectively bad for the child in terms of either safety or welfare.  A standard will need to be set for this judgement, in terms of welfare and safety but possibly other categories.  For example, does "welfare" include education?  If a child is a slow learner, who determines whether such lethargy is down to a failure in the duty of the parent?

3.  "the place of the parents"
This one is a doozie.  I can't imagine how an entire government can spend four or more years developing an amendment and leave this appallingly sloppy phrase in place.  Leaving aside for a moment that this phrase all but codifies the phrase "Nanny State" in the constitution, is it the case that the state will adopt a legal obligation to correctly parent the child, and should that child not turn out so good, have the option to litigate?  Only parents can parent.  If the state seeks to care for a child, then they should enumerate the functions - food, shelter, education, healthcare. No more.  The state will not teach a child right from wrong, or about the birds and the bees, nor should it have any obligation to, save in enforcing the law.  The State is not and never will be a parent.  

4. "the best interests of the child"
Again, who determines what are the best interests of the child?  What are such standards?  Is it in the best interests of the child that he be sent to a fee paying school?  Or to Mosque on sabbath?  Or to soccer training on Saturdays?

5. "any child who is capable of forming his or her own views"
This one is a nightmare.  On the one hand, it needs to go in - you have to ask the child what they want, but then you also need to make a determination as to whether the child actually should have it.  Children may ask for sweets for breakfast, lunch and dinner, but it's not good for them.  But that is certainly a view, and the child will have been well capable of articulating it, even demanding it.  This phrase really boils down to the definition of a child.  Is it someone under eighteen?  There are boys with AK47s in the jungles of Congo as young as 10.  So putting in an age would have been difficult too.  

All in all, this reads more like a policy paper than a constitutional amendment.  My view?  They should have been more brief and less prescriptive.  That's what constitutions are about.  This is too long winded, and dives into too much detail and tries to do too much.  It will fail, because any one of the five items above, interpreted in a particular way, has the potential to upset everyone.

Patent Law versus Anti-Trust

I've thought for some time that intellectual property law generally was in trouble, and as an artificial construct that requires positive law to support it, the lack of universal application certainly gives cause for concern.  In essence, the Internet allows the publication of all intellectual property, instantly, to almost everyone in the world.

Ownership of intellectual property is intangible; ideas, inventions, innovations are nebulous concepts, and to award the official title of ownership to the first person or company who has either the wit or resources to go through the registration process first (or, as kids would say, "baggsies!!") seems arbitrary.  We are social beings, and operate within a social construct.  If you invent something, say, in the shower, should the shower owner own a piece of it?  If your thought process is triggered by a movie, should the studio claim a piece?

Lance Armstrong: A Metaphor for Modern Sport

What? Something on my nose?

Lance Armstrong's capitulation to USADA and the subsequent reaction of various factions says much about not just cycling, but about modern sports. Armstrong's move was calculated and measured, each statement carefully managed, each appearance (including yesterday's mountain bike ride) choreographed and staged.  Yesterday's messaging was all about the future - "It Will Be Great" was the theme of yesterday's press event - about charity work and get fit programmes, and the Livestrong foundation.  Livestrong has it's own lobbying firm. Several papers dutifully repeated the seeded message that donations to the Livestrong foundation were up by orders of magnitude on Friday. 

The Sub Judice Rule and Public Debate

Thirteen years ago, the late Charles J Haughey was sweating. It had been almost ten years since he had been in office, but his financial affairs were being carefully unpicked.  He found himself in the High Court, charged with obstructing the work of the McCracken tribunal.  Within twelve months, however he was off the hook.  Some pamphlets had been issued campaigning to 'jail the corrupt politicians', and then Tánaiste Mary Harney had said effectively the same.  The High Court upheld the claim that the comments had created a 'prejudicial climate', and while there was a 'fade factor' that would allow the effect to dissipate over time, potentially allowing a retrial, Haughey never again went before the courts, and died without any judgement being passed on him in 2006.

The Culture of NAMA Stinks

Today, Brendan McDonagh announced with great glee that the National Asset Management Agency had made a profit of €247m for 2011.  In his interview on RTE Radio at One O'Clock, the smug McDonagh, who commands an austerity adjusted salary of €370,000 (having taken a voluntary 15% pay cut earlier this year) propounded that the organisation had breezed passed the cynicism of two years ago, and circumnavigated low expectation to deliver what were astonishingly good results, notwithstanding a write-down of €1.27bn in the value of its assets.  It was as if NAMA was just another Irish success story, and the Celtic Tiger was back again, and McDonagh was the new breed of entrepreneur, leading the charge out of depression!

Golf and Banality

No fun

The British Open (or "The Open", as the Brits like to call it) is drawing to a conclusion, and there's some disappointment amongst the great and the good that the wind hasn't really blown, the rain hasn't fallen, and whatever wind has actually blown has not been of the prevailing disposition.  All in all, it's been a very ordinary golf course, although at least the bunkers have provided some variability.  And therein lies the crux of it.

American golf, driven by the sponsors, has become more and more dull and mechanical as sponsors and brands have increasingly driven out variability from the game.  Few significant competitions are played in difficult weather; bunkers are generally benign; and "the rough" is more like the fairway at my local club.  Technology in clubs and balls has accelerated to be more forgiving, sports psychologists minimise the yips, and the game becomes less of a lottery and more of a predictable "event".  And the more predictable it becomes, the easier it is for brands to invest.

The majors - at least the British and US Opens, along with the American PGA (but not the US Masters at Augusta) - are the exception, usually.  They command excitement because they introduce genuine variability, with courses the pros aren't used to playing, often in conditions they're not used to playing in either.  I played Lahinch once, probably the best course I ever played, and I think I learned that day what golf should be.  It's not just a statistics game, a yardage game, a technical project.  It's about feel, sensation, variety, and agility.  Not just strength, accuracy, and execution. It's about fun, and living, not just about work, and scoring.  That's why Tiger fell from grace - he's all work and scoring (no pun intended), and doesn't - still! - know how to live, and have fun.

Why the Capital Should be Moved to Cork (Seriously)

They are rabbiting on again on the Marian Finucane show on radio again this morning, this time about the conflict of interest story re: Terry Prone and Tom Savage, the PR Consultant and her husband, the Chairman of the RTE Authority.  Government representatives (to whom the RTE Authority reports) are sitting on the panel. in the RTE Studios (that Savage is, ostensibly, responsible for), presumably all being paid by RTE to be there (saving, one would hope, the politicians themselves).  Mike Soden, government sanctioned Central Bank Commissioner (and former CEO of Bank of Ireland); Pat Rabbitte Minister for Communications, from Mayo, now Dublin South West; Sam Smyth, long-in-the-tooth Dublin journalist, from the North, resident in Dublin for several decades now; and so on and so forth.  The Dublin elite, talking about Dublin conflicts of interest, feigning shock and amazement for the benefit of their advertisers.

PS I LoveYou (Not)!!

The arguments in Brian Lucey's article today in the Cork Examiner in defence of Croke Park today are baseless, and reveal a core relativism and lack of substance in the Social Partners insistence on no job cuts.

In the first instance, if the state did not promise no job cuts, and insisted upon involuntary redundancies, even at a low scale, none of the social partners could have gone back to their members and say 'we got a deal'. The deal would not have been done - it was tight anyway - and we'd have been straight into bitter wrangling, strikes, and industrial unrest in the public service. That binary, blackmail view - give us what we want or we strike - is an emphatic rejection of the core social ethos of public service. It is now no more than a job, and we'll walk out if we think it's necessary (and then say it's about patient welfare, or preserving efficiencies, not about the size of the TV or the year on the reg plate). Even if we were to accept that striking in a time of economic crisis was a permissible option for the public service, which seems wholly deplorable, no such option exists for the substantially non-unionised private service. This situation exists largely due to government policy through years of dilution of labour laws and shifts in position to accommodate FDI.

A Response to Vincent Browne

Vincent Browne's lament for lost sovereignty - invoking Rousseau in the process, who was born three hundred years old this week - adorns this morning's Irish Times.  It's an aspirational piece, without resolution and reactionary.  The language of what he would see as European neo-imperialism is versed in words like sovereignty and democracy, and this requires an examination of those principles.  The article is to be lauded for that.  But let's look at some of the themes - "freedom", the "arbitrariness of market forces", and the "common good".

First, on the notion of freedom, and man being born "free".  There is no such thing as absolute freedom.  Thomas Hobbes, a predecessor of Rousseau, argued famously on the state of nature that mankind was in before political order took hold.  The life of a man in that state of nature was "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short," Hobbes wrote in his magnum opus, Leviathan.  Man is born dependent on mother, then family, then society.  His existence is relative, and social.  

Eurocrisis: Sovereignty, Federalism, and Choices

Funny, nein?

The current travails of Europe are not new.  A group of countries bound by proximity yet separated by terrain, for thousands of years the continent has been dominated by war, conquest and turmoil.  Today, we see her once more tearing herself apart as the unequal distribution of resources sets itself against capitalist economics and nominative socialist leadership.  While the things that bind us together – the Monnet and Schuman version of a shared heritage, the fledgling institutions of the European Union, and an increasingly pervasive English language – remain, the smaller things that separate us become exacerbated.  Even the recently held European Football Championships, or before that the Eurovision Song Contest, tend to reinforce the more serious political and economic rivalries within the Union.  Greece versus Germany was billed everywhere as David versus Goliath, Coloniser versus colonized, Merkel versus whoever the current Prime Minister of Greece was.  Some Irish fans hoisted an Irish tricolour with the words “Angela Merkel Thinks We’re At Work” emblazoned across it, an image that made the front cover of Bild and other news media around the world – the distinction was clear, Merkel and Germany was “them”, and Ireland was “us”, there was no such thing as a European.

Bankia Shares Still Falling

I know I should short Bankia shares, but not having traded open stock in ten years I'm too lazy to do it now.  They continue to fall, and the politics is mirroring Anglo.  The only difference this time is that Spain is so big, important, and relevant (unlike Ireland) that European leaders may once again revisit their comfort zone of double standards, moral hazard, and down-the-road-can-kicking and step in to articifially support the Spanish system.  At least until after French elections. Right?

I'll get my coat.

Is Spain "Turning a Corner"? (Of Course Not)

Meanwhile, in Madrid, things have got a distinctly Irish feel.  Spain's third largest bank Bankia was under pressure to raise funds, as investors saw it was too risky.  The State stepped in, taking a 45% stake.  "The Bank of Spain said Bankia and BFA, its parent company, had informed it that the conversion of €4.47bn of state aid in the bank into ordinary shares was "the most advisable option for strengthening the [bank's] financial soundness"."  OK, now where have we heard that before?

Well, way back in December 2008, the Irish Government decided to take a 75% stake in the country's third largest bank, Anglo Irish Bank, which was under pressure to raise funds.  "Dublin “will continue to reinforce the position of Anglo Irish and will make further capital available if required so that it remains a sound and viable institution,” the finance ministry said," injecting €1.5bn into the institution.

What happened next? Well, in Spain, Olli Rehn declared that the Spanish plan to manage the Bankia problem should dispel any doubts about the "stability of the Spanish banking sector."  In Ireland, the Commission approved the Irish government plan to recapitalise Anglo on January 14th 2009, but two days later, Finance Minister Brian Lenihan dropped another bombshell: "A €1.5bn (£1.34bn) recapitalisation package unveiled after a loan scandal at Anglo Irish is "not now the appropriate and effective means to secure its continued viability" and a full-scale nationalisation will be initiated," he said.  The hole was effectively too big for a partial nationalisation.  In Spain, there remains some uncertainty about the shortfall in Bankia.  As it was an amalgamation of lots of banks, hurriedly scooped together and floated in 2011, one suspects that there was some hope that any holes could be socialised across the new group.  In truth, no one really knows how deep the hole is in the Spanish Banking Sector.  Which was just like Ireland - the bank debt seemed manageable, but then got bigger, and bigger.

Today, Spanish Prime Minister Rajoy warned that Spain faced exile from the bond markets.  Ireland decided to withdraw from the bond markets in September 2010.  Ireland's decision was not theirs to make - they were priced out of the market, in the same way that the current trajectory of bond yields for Spanish sovereign debt is threatening to exclude Spain.  The banking system goes first. Private credit to the private banks becomes unattainable at reasonable rates, and so the government has to step in in order to prevent a banking sector collapse.  That nationalises an indeterminable amount of debt, or at least exposes the sovereign to the debt.  This is where Spain is now.  This is where Ireland found itself in early 2009.  We limped along for another eighteen months as the astonishing reality crept upon us, revelation by revelation, in one bank, then two, then three, then the systemic and cultural issues became evident.  Spain won't get 18 months, the markets are wise to the pattern.

I'm not worried about the Eurozone, I'm worried about the EU!

Oh, time. They say it's a great healer, but it also papers over the cracks.  The European Union project has been an outstanding success.  Building on common interests, of trade, movement, security and even threatening to break out into a unified force in Global Affairs in the last few years, Jean Monnet would be very pleased.  But time makes us forget.  We forget what brought us together in the first place.  We forget the wars, the horror.  We forget the divisiveness of nationalism, let alone ultra nationalism.  And so, while in good times all boats floated on the success of the Eurozone economy, in bad times it's every country for themselves, and the strongest will dominate the weak.

Germany has enjoyed extraordinary privilege in its membership of the Euro, through persistently low interest rates and a willing export market at fixed, favourable exchange rates.  The Eurozone's success depends in many respects on Germany, but it is also true that Germany's perpetuation of its own success is dependent on retaining those privileges.  In simple terms, Europe needs to learn that when good things happen, they should be shared.  And when bad things happen, they should also be shared.  That has not been the case.

In a sense it was easy for Monnet, Schumann, and all the rest of them to cede sovereignty and make huge leaps in integration in aftermath of an appalling and hugely destructive war.  Nationalism seemed empty, useless, meaningless in the face of what we had all done to ourselves, and to each other.  We have forgotten all that.  Our motivations have reverted to isolated self-interest, and short term politics.  This is not a recent phenomenon.  The failure of successive governments and EU administrations to drive deeper integration, to make multiculturalism a success, to play down national pride in favour of regional belonging, has been stark. Our education programmes have not been strong enough, our political leaders have not been wise enough, and it appears now inevitable that we will all pay a terrible collective price for out naivete.  Great states and countries are born of fire - the new Europe came so close to building a single, federal state, but everyone failed.  Maybe we shouldn't be too hard on ourselves, it's never been done before.  And perhaps there are lessons in it for future generations who might be brave enough to have a go once more.

I am not feeling happy this morning.