Phew! It looks like we may have got out of that one. That is if
the United States doesn’t go ahead and attack Syria anyway for the hell of it. Next
is to leapfrog from this settlement to some sort of face-saving deal with the
moderate opposition and then everyone’s ok with fighting whoever’s left and if
Hama has to be shelled again it’s because of those damned Al-Qaeda nuts and the
US could even help out with that with a drone-strike here and there. If it
does turn out anything like that it’ll be a big win for the other side like
2006 but maybe it has to be because there’s still a bigger win to be had. This
would have to involve the interested powers forcing a deal on their various
allied and client actors that would end this long middle-east war altogether,
with an appointment to renew the agreement after a fixed amount of time, short
enough so that no party is in a position where it has nothing to lose but long
enough to prevent regular outbursts of coercion where better negotiation
positions are sought and allowing a more
healthy status quo to form itself: Arab- Israeli, Saudi-Iran, Sunni-Shia, the
lot of it on the table and to be shared out with those that remain seated. All
the parties will have lost something to an aggressor but will be guaranteed
that their existence is secure by mutual consent and trans-national
supervision. Create losers and then compensate those losers. This alone
stimulates the world economy with the promise of solutions to even bigger problems
creating enough wealth to at least give us space to give up our various
addictions on oil and weapons and the like.
This is do-able humanity! It’s just a choice. Is it imperialism? Maybe,
but wasn’t it going to be anyway, whatever happened and whatever beautiful
aspirations you held? Is this just cynicism? No,the Empire I propose will
belong to all and form itself voluntarily from the realisation of common
interests by rational players. Crackers! That is name of this Empire. No, it’s
not a stupid name. The rainbow dragon king is lurking at the periphery of your
vision waiting for you to start following his agenda and begin history proper.
You will be bathed in the light like a rising sun. Do you see!
Anyway while I’m doing repeats I’m going to re-pontificate on a pressing
local issue here in the green and pleasant land of UKOGBANI.I speak of transport
and more specifically the 2 controversial infrastructure projects HS2( the
proposed high-speed north-south rail link) and the possible construction of
another London airport or extension of the existing ones. My alternative
solution to both these problems is to combine them. HS2 instead of going
straight to Birmingham, instead heads directly north from London along the
existing M1 Motorway until it reaches Doncaster Robin Hood airport (formerly
RAF Finningly) which already has a nice long runway and could easily be
enhanced to be London’s next airport as I believe the journey between them
would still be less than an hour. From this hub lines could run to Birmingham,
to Sheffield, Manchester and Liverpool and another to Newcastle and Edinburgh. Both
problems, of course, are related to capacity which is ultimately a question of
population. Another way you could deal with that problem is to start world war
3. It’s entirely your choice.
The picture this month is of the Koosalagoopagoop from the last series of Dexter’s Laboratory, slightly more yellow and less colourful than in his earlier appearances but as lovably annoying and ridiculous as ever. I was going to use the infamous Neville Chamberlain Peace-in-our-time picture as it amused me given my peacenik ramblings but I thought it might confuse you mammal cuties. It’s certainly not my intention to confuse people, merely to dazzle them a bit. Anywoo, this is the title! However, I’d also like to play something autumnal as we enter that saddest of seasons. I don’t care what you think I love these guys, possibly the best prog-rock band of them all. Better than Yes, better than Gryphon. Better even than Jethro Tull or the Moody Blues. This is Genesis in transition. Beloved genius Peter Gabriel has gone off to spend more time with the voices in his head so a young beardy cockney drummer steps up and shows the world what he can do.
24-09 Updates! Sorry this blog has been so boringly political for the last 2 months, Koos-fans. It's not always like this, honest! Any-whey, it's hard for a historical-politico anorak like me not to get all excitable when the nuclear powers start taking sides in what is already a disastrous conflict. Of course I still maintain, against all evidence and general opinion, that the John Kerry 'gaffe' that opened up the door for a peaceful settlement was actually hashed out at the G20 summit 2 days previously and that PM Cammers losing the vote on Syria in the H of C the week before was political choreography to extract us from whatever catastrophe may have followed military action. In both cases a perceived loss of face was preferable to the consequences of whatever kind of war Syria would have turned out to be. Of course, this situation is far from resolved and cannot be until peace returns to that unfortunate land and that still seems so desperately unlikely despite the comprehensive and not-at-all over-simplistic and naïve peace plan I have outlined above. I also like eating cakes. I'll talk about that next month I promise.
Lots of love
Your friend
Koos
#I'm not on twitter I'm afraid #sorry! #ijustlikehash
