[lbo-talk] Galloway, Creativity Gap

[Gar Lipow]

On 5/22/05, Carl Remick <carlremick at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 
> >From: "James Heartfield" <Heartfield at blueyonder.co.uk>
> >
> >... Galloway's old Labour politics have been tried and found wanting 
> years
> >ago. They are no alternative in the here and now, just nostalgia for an
> >English Jerusalem that never was.
> 
> Aha, if I'm not mistaken, James, your sympathy is for the prophet of an
> English Jerusalem that never will be: Mick Hume. I just ran across the
> following blog entry, which is identified as Hume's view of Galloway's
> Respect Party:
> 
> "Respect acts as a reminder of why I describe myself as 'on the left, but
> not of it'. It has been accused of flirting with the Islamic lobby in its
> campaign against the Iraq war, and it is noticeable that its manifesto
> commitment to defending civil liberties against the Government makes no
> mention of defending free speech against new Labour's incitement to
> religious hatred laws. But even worse than that is Respect's embrace of
> today's fashionably backward Western prejudices, opposing everything from 
> GM
> foods and nuclear power to more animal research and road building. As the
> Left turns into the enemy of progress and the embodiment of self-loathing,
> Respect sometimes sounds like the most conservative voice in this election 
> —
> a pretty remarkable achievement, given who it is up against."
> <http://strange_stuff.blogspot.com/2005/04/mick-hume-on-respect.html>
> 
> As a public service, I note that anyone interested in joining Respect may 
> do
> so online at www.respectcoalition.org <http://www.respectcoalition.org> or 
> by calling 020 8980 3507.
> 
> Carl
> 
> 
> ___________________________________
> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
> 

The details of the Britains religious hatred laws I don't know. Tend to be 
close to a freedom of speech absolutist, so I might well be against them. 

But nuclear power - horribly overpriced way to produce electricity. Wind is 
cheaper per kilowatt hour. And the UK coast has plenty of wind, not mention 
some of your highland areas.

GM food - not against genetic engineering in principle. But current 
technology requires markers for antibiotic resistance be placed in every 
genetically engineered product. (Short version - you can't just take a laser 
and modify the genes in an organism. You have to modify microrganism, and 
let them make the change for you. But the only a tiny fraction of the 
microbes you alter change. How to sort them? Make them anti-biotic 
resistant. Soak the batch in antibiotics. The surviving microbes contain 
your altered genes, and can alter your plants or pig or whatever.) And the 
ability for that antibiotic resistance to jump species has been well 
documented. Also so far GM has been used more for profit of big corporations 
than to feed the poor. (Anyway the world already produces around 2,800 
calories per person - including 75 grams of protein. Don't see world hunger 
as technological problem given t hose figures.)

Road building? Money a lot better spent on more trains. So - sounds pretty 
forward thinking to me.

-- 
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