The Anonymous Widower

America Is Thinking Of You

This statement of Barack Obama is very easy to say after the massacre in Aurora.

If America is thinking then they should change their culture and attitude to firearms. I read this article by Rod Dreher on the BBC’s web site.  He is an American Conservative and makes some strong and well-thought points.

It shows how the problem is a lot worse than anybody in the UK thinks.

I do think though that spillover from American culture is behind some of the gun crime in the UK and other countries.

July 23, 2012 Posted by | News, World | , , , | Leave a comment

Jimmy Carter Attacks Obama over Human Rights

Jimmy Carter has attacked Barack Obama over human rights and especially assassination of possible terrorists using drone attacks.  It’s here in the Independent.

I’ve always felt that Jimmy got a bad hand, when he was US President and is seriously underrated. On the other hand, Barack Obama is proving one of the most disappointing Presidents, I have witnessed.  And I go back to Ike!

July 4, 2012 Posted by | News, World | , , , | 4 Comments

Do We Really Want a Mormon as US President?

I’m unsure, that having a leader of a country with strong religious beliefs is a good idea. They need strong humanist principles, that are probably subscribed to, by most good people, but that is all.

After all, with the exception of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, I don’t think, we’ve had a Prime Minister in recent years, who went anywhere near a church, except for the usual ceremonial duties, like weddings, funerals and affairs of state.

You can argue, whether we did better under a leader, who regularly went to church or we didn’t. However, in my view to belong to a church with strong political views is wrong, as they might try to divert you from important policies. For instance, we have the stance of the Roman Catholic church on contraception.

I don’t think the leaders in countries like France, Germany and other well-respected nations have outrageous religious views.

So to have a US President, who is a Mormon like Mitt Romney, might just upset the balance in the world. Let’s hope the good citizens of the United States see sense and return Barack Obama for a second term, otherwise it might find itself in a minority of one on the world stage.

Read Mark Mardell’s view of Mitt Romney here. Here’s a paragraph from the article.

The Obama team also wants to promote the image of Mr Romney as very right wing.

Not simply conservative but old-fashioned. The out-of-touch old guy who would bring back the past. In an excellent, if long, article the New York Magazine quotes an unnamed Obama strategist: “He’s the fifties, he is retro, he is backward, and we are forward—that’s the basic construct.”

“If you’re a woman, you’re Hispanic, you’re young, or you’ve gotten left out, you look at Romney and say, ‘This guy is gonna take us back to the way it always was, and guess what? I’ve never been part of that.'”

He sounds the sort of guy, that most British politicians would instantly not warm to.

May 30, 2012 Posted by | News | , , , | Leave a comment

The Disgrace of Augusta

I quite like golf on the television, but I never watch the Masters at Augusta.

Like many people, I can remember when blacks could only be caddies or waiters. In fact the founder of the tournament insisted that in his lifetime, it was only contested by white players with black caddies.

At least now President Obama has weighed into the row about women being allowed to watch. But then he knows that with the issues of birth control and abortion likely to figure in the next election, it will help him get re-elected.

The Masters also have an interesting problem this year, in that one of their major sponsors, IBM, has a female Chief Executive. Will they go for money or ditch an outdated principle?

In The Times today, Matthew Syed, one of their most-respected sports writers, calls Augusta a laughing stock.

The Times also indicates that some Scottish golf clubs have a similar attitude to women and St. Andrews has a particular problem, in that the Principal of the University is female.

I also remember a friend, who couldn’t use a corporate membership at a golf club in the south of England. But being the man he was, he talked them round.

April 7, 2012 Posted by | Sport | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Afghanistan

With the sad and tragic deaths of six British soldiers in Afghanistan, the news from the United States, where two hard-line religious fanatics, not well-disposed to Islam,  are vying for the Republican nomination for President, is not good.

Let’s hope that the United States sees sense and re-elects President Obama. At least he’s not in the blast-Iran-back-to-the-Stone-Age-tendency.

Otherwise, incidents like yesterday’s will get worse and more often.

March 8, 2012 Posted by | News | , , , | Leave a comment

Was President Obama Born in the United States?

There are various people who claim that his birth certificate is a forgery and one of these an Arizona sheriff is reported here on the BBC.

I was born in 1947 and my birth certificate was wrongly filled in and then I lost it. But the replacement still had the change certified by a signed-over stamp. So even in the UK sixty-five years ago, it would be difficult to get it wrong.

Now President Obama was born in Honolulu on the 4th August, 1961, so he is only about ten years older than my two remaining sons. At that time, you not only got a birth certificate, but the baby would be entered into hospital records. And of course, there are lots of family photos of the baby.

So there will be lot of evidence, that would stand up in a court of law.  Certainly in the UK!

Intriguingly,  we don’t have any laws about where our Prime Minister has to be born. It all depends on quality, not an accident of birth.

I also know of someone, who was born in the United States, because his father was the UK Ambassador. As his father went on to get a hereditary peerage and the right to sit in the House of Lords, he could have ended up as a member of the UK House of Lords and US President.

So it looks like the challenge to Obama is very much spurious and judging by the profile of the Arizona sheriff, based very much on race!

March 2, 2012 Posted by | News | , , , | Leave a comment

Donald Trump, Alex Salmond and Wind Turbines

There’s an interesting article in Friday’s Guardian, called Donald Trump wind turbine fiasco could be defining for Scotland. The first part is about Donald Trump opposition to several large offshore wind turbines by his new golf course near Aberdeen and how he is going to fund the opponents of wind power in Scotland.

By the way the Birther Movement mentioned in the Guardian article, as part-funded by Trump,  are a group of conspiracy theorists, who believe President Obama was not born in Hawaii. So Trump has form, when it comes to funding opposition groups that might help his personal ambitions or business interests.  There’s more on the movement here.

There is one statement after Trump and that is this.

But the idea of Trump as good business versus loony-greens hellbent on no-jobs is nonsense. Bloomberg New Energy Finance recently suggested onshore wind will be cost competitive with gas and coal generation by 2016.

I hope Bloomberg is right, as the waters around these island certainly have a lot of wind.

In some ways, the second part of the Guardian article is in some ways the more significant. It talks about how a wind turbine is being built at Portobello in Edinburgh. I wonder what the good burghers of Scotland’s capital think of the project?

 

February 26, 2012 Posted by | News | , , , , , | 2 Comments

The Cloud-Cuckoo Land That is Republican Politics

I’ve just looked at this page on the BBC web site, which sets out the policies of the various Republican candidates, who might stand against President Obama. It looks like they are all against same-sex marriage and abortion, for cutting immigration into the United States, making everybody pay for their own health care and reducing tax rates to companies.

I can’t think of any past or present British politician, except for perhaps the BNP, who would promote such a toxic mix of electoral suicide.

But then the United States is different and you sort out your own problems.

It goes without saying, that no-one would be in favour of improving the justice and penal system and abolishing the death penalty.  But then most Americans believe in vengeance and not justice.

As I’ve said Barack Obama has been a disappointment to me, but he’s orders of magnitude better than this psychotic bunch.

January 4, 2012 Posted by | News | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Racial Bias of the US Death Penalty

This article in today’s Guardian should be read by all.

It is one of the best and most scientifically correct articles I’ve seen on the death penalty and how in the United States, there is a racial bias in who gets convicted and executed.

In some ways, it sums up why I feel that Obama is one of the most disappointing US Presidents, I can remember.

Surely as a lawyer, who has practised at the sharp end and has seen how the death penalty aroused controversy in Illinois, he should have strong feeling against this cruel and unusual punishment.  But on the other hand he did approve the mission which led to the execution without trial of Osama Bin Laden.

January 3, 2012 Posted by | News | , , | Leave a comment

Cable Rounds on US Nutters

Vince Cable today accused US Republican politicians for holding up a deal to reduce US government debt.  It’s all here on the BBC. Here’s an extract.

Vince Cable has attacked leading US Republican politicians for holding up a deal to reduce US government debt.

Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, the business secretary called them “a few right-wing nutters in the American Congress”.

Unless a deal on Capitol Hill is agreed before 2 August, the US Treasury could run out of money to pay its bills.

Mr Cable said it presented a bigger risk to the global markets than the continuing debt woes in the eurozone.

I think it is true to say that the United States doesn’t have a debt problem. It has a severe debt problem!

US policy-making seems to be a bit like the arguments in the Middle Ages about how many angels could dance on the head of a pin.

The only crumb of comfort is that the United States has been there before and a deal is always done.

July 24, 2011 Posted by | News, World | , , , | 2 Comments

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