Public issues

I conclude a separate email concerning matters that do provoke in me strong emotions and can lead to vituperation. I was particularly moved by an edition of Any Questions on the radio, held in Kibworth, Leicestershire, where two elderly friends now live.
The EU treaty was one of those up for discussion - should there be a referendum for it? Now, I don't think there should for the same reason that there should not have been one. Who would actually read the text? I think maybe 1% of the country would. People basically have more important things to deal with in their lives and if that should be so, then a referendum is unnecessary and indeed counter-productive to true democratic engagement. David, now Lord, Steel gave a masterclass in being one of the few people able to confront Tony Benn's polemicisms in real time. So if no-one at large will read it, it should like all other obscurantist notions like regulating the copyright of certain cheese manufactures, be delegated to parliament. Certainly few MPs would themselves read it, but the party whips would enforce their compliance on orders from the cabinet who will have read the treaty. Gordon Brown played a key role in shaping it. Now some xenophobes carp about more power being given to unelected bureaucrats and they get a clap (when they should get a slap). Unelected bureaucrats - then make the elected in a true EU democracy. Oh, no, no, no, no. That would mean more integration. These dunderheads prefer the Brussels eurocrat to remain unelected the same way left-wingers prefer the current administration in the White House - it gives them something to kick against. What I say is stop dissembling. Say you hate Europeans and all engagement with them. Put up or shut up. And as a postscript, in an interdependent, globalised world, the only true independence for a country now is to take it back to the Stone Age, something the xenophobes would prefer since it would guarntee the superiority of the fist (in a metaphysical and physical sense) as the main instrument of power. That's what they want.
A 67 year old man's killers were convicted today of his manslaughter and public disturbance. The unique fact is that they were all under 15. The parents sat with them in the dock, ostensibly to comfort them, but really they deserved to be there as well. On the unanimous guilty verdict of the jury. The parents started crying with their children. Well, if they had been proper parents they would not have allowed their kids to be in the position to form an aggressive and noxious gang. Rhy Ifans' parents knew how to be good parents. The trouble is, like trying to imitate the myth of the gangsta chill, most of these kids are middle-class disillusioned with life and nothing to fill it. Is it any wonder that children seek binge drinking to reach oblivion before they have to contemplate the imponderables of thousands of years?
Finally, the Princess of Wales. The Diana legacy regarding AIDS and landmines is admirable. The Diana hype which is everything else from the day she died is detestable. That might seem bemusing to get worked up over an item of supreme triviality, but the Diana brouhaha totally overshadowed the death of Mother Teresa the next day who was relegated to a footnote in history. Mother Teresa did incomparably more for humanity than Diana did and not by occasionally stepping down from an ivory tower. The Wembley concert for her would-be birthday was stomach-churning enough, raising it to the stature of African poverty and climate change, but it was for good causes. The public memorial service was a mistake, it should have been private. If it had been for Mother Teresa, I would have no complaints but it was for a fashion horse who was very good at playing the public. It is disgusting navel gazing, from which I could not put enough distance between me and it. But there is one further aspect of the Diana legacy - in cars wear seatbelts.