POLITICS and RELIGION continue to destroy the world we live in        

POLITICS and RELIGION continue to destroy the world we live in

For more than 60 years I have seen the unbelievable incompetence, greed and immorality of their leaders push us firmly towards destruction

Do we have any hope?

Perhaps – if AI intends to build ROBOTS without politics and religion, just programmed to help make lives better for the inhabitants of this planet.                                                                                                                                                                                  

Born on Robbie Burns birthday, probably just a romantic, optimistic dreamer I decided to take a look via Mr Google

https://www.oxfordeconomics.com/resource/ai-and-robots-in-2025-the-robotics-revolution-we-predicted-has-arrived/

I went on the link above to find out more. Within 5 minutes I was scared out of my mind

  • 20 million manufacturing jobs to go by 2030, I believe this will increase exponentially. What will these people do?
  • All the service jobs will be at risk. Same comment and question
  • The divide between urban and rural, between high cost labour and low cost labour economies, is gong to widen
  • Everything is heading towards an even wider gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ – civil unrest is already just round the corner

Then I relaxed and started to think

The robots will find a way not to have politicians because they know that politicians will fight to use the increased speed of manufacturing to produce more sophisticated weapons faster. In the same way they will not allow religions as they provide most of the reasons we have wars

Could AI Robots develop a dictator with a big enough brain to control the world in a fair way? Since The war to end all wars finished in 1918 Human Dictators have not been able to control in a fair way – they were all too political and religion biased. Just look at the current bunch round the world

That is all miserable and I want to finish 2024 with some positive thoughts

First big thought – a bit selfish but I am too old to worry about AI if it goes wrong

Second big thought – how lucky I am to be a contemporary of some great people, unfortunately none of them in government!

  • Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Johnny Cash, Roger Waters and dozens of great singers at that time. They and Buck Ram who wrote for The Platters produced beautiful poetry to beautiful music. You need feeling to write and sing like this. Do robots have feelings? There are so many more from this age group, I could fill this page
  • Gerald Davies, JPR Williams, Gareth Edwards – three superstar rugby players amongst the many I played with and against – will rugby exist under AI robotic control?
  • Lynn Davies and Ann Packer – Olympic gold medallists in 1964. Two modest but inspirational athletes. Chris Chataway and Chris Brasher combined to help Roger Bannister break the magic 4 minute mile. All true amateurs. Wonderful achievers
  • Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and the slightly older Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino, Nick Faldo and Tony Jacklin and then Tiger Woods – what a group of inspirational golfers
  • Great tennis players – Lew Hoad, Ken Rosewall, Rod Laver, John Newcombe, Tony Trabert soon to be followed by Bjorn Borg, John McEnroe, Arthur Ashe

Will robots be running, playing rugby, golf, tennis? Can AI give robots souls like Bob Dylan or is poetry from the heart going to die?

OMG! Think of the Classical music AI can produce from a few programming instructions – Mozart and co. you are redundant

Sport can lose its inspiration effect if technology gets too clever. Already we live with the terrible decision to tell schools to make sport non competitive. Everyone’s a winner! – bullshit!

Next thing the Wokes will be doing is to increase the classifications for sport.

Think about it – so many more Olympic gold medals if these classifications come in, everyone is in with a chance!

Make more classifications you Wokes so everyone can have a medal and remove ‘achievement’ from our dictionary

Male – female – gay – lesbian – trans (from a male) – trans (from a female). All of these classifications can be OLD, Middle aged, Young, very young, infant  and we could also have all of these classifications for robots as well (don’t want to leave them out).

Hey – same for Paralympians.

Keep going Iain – we could have more competitors than spectators and the Olympic Village could become the Olympic City

So everyone is a winner? No everyone is a loser

Will anyone be able to program AI to produce song lyrics like this? No you have to be a Bob Dylan.

I first heard Mr Tambourine Man in 1965. I will never tire of listening to it. This is the first verse. Do yourself a favour and listen to it, preferably on video on YouTube. I have never tried to work out what he is saying, I am satisfied just to listen to the magical combination of words. Four verses – all magic

Though I know that evening’s empire has returned into sand
Vanished from my hand
Left me blindly here to stand, but still not sleeping
My weariness amazes me, I am branded on my feet
I have no one to meet
And my ancient empty street’s too dead for dreaming

CIVIL WAR IN THE UK IS NEARLY HERE

CIVIL WAR IN THE UK IS NEARLY HERE

ELON MUSK said it recently. Over 30 years ago I said “If we continue to deindustrialize like this there will be civil war in the UK”

Too many of my friends were seduced by Mrs Thatcher’s policy ‘reduce manufacturing industry, develop service professions’

They did not give credibility to the reasons that provoked me to say it

These reasons have contributed year after year in our journey towards self destruction and the only politicians who seem to have an understanding of it currently are from the REFORM party. The Tories lost their chances when they missed the opportunity when it was all starting to elect Notman Tebbitt and more recently Rory Stewart to their leadership, a contender when Boris Johnson was elected. Norman Tebbitt and Rory Stewart had very different backgrounds but both cared about people generally. Rory Stewart has had amazing political and life experiences for a young man. Oh what could have been if the Tories had had sense then. Oh what they could achieve if they brought him back now, still a young man – no chance of that, see note at the end of this rant

If you disagree with me you are invited to respond on this page. Agree or disagree – share your own experiences please

These were my predictions and I believe they are now happening

De industrialisation is probably the most damaging decision for the UK by UK politicians – ever.

  • It reduced in a very short time a major percentage of good, satisfying jobs for mainly men who took satisfaction in being able to provide a home, clothing and food and a satisfying lifestyle for their families
  • It blew apart whole communities, especially those in the coal mining and steel areas. From skilled worker to relying on benefits in two generations
  • It has created an ever widening gap between white collar and blue collar workers
  • Self esteem falls through the floor, parents on benefits do not inspire the next generation and so it is into drugs and crime

Service Jobs and high tech engineering jobs will suit many in the UK but not the majority of the UK workforce. For the country responsible for the industrial revolution it is obscenely stupid that we have scrapped and shipped overseas hundreds of thousands of blue collar jobs in automotive, steel, mining, defence, machine tools (the mother of all manufacturing), oil and gas. Becoming a Barista does not satisfy these workers!

The lack of control of immigration has brought major problems that add to civil unrest

Now we have too few blue collar jobs

We have too many not contributing to the UK economy, too many having to rely on benefits

Even as a Christian country we managed to have serious divisions between Catholics and Protestants. Now Islam has been added to the mix of religions – and the problem is they do not mix! The first years, decades of Caribbean, African, Indian and Pakistani immigrants was reasonably controlled. Allowing immigration to mushroom out of control, even when it is named ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION by government after government, has created the danger

The new government is being very heavy handed in dealing with the riots. Some of these people deserve prison but not all, some are just very frustrated by the current situation. Surely there is a lower cost way to bring them back to sanity? How about giving them a provisional jail sentence but this opportunity first:-

  • Set up residential units, far less costly than prison, where they attend presentations and discussions for a couple of hours every day. They can air their feelings and hopefully hear some positives for the future. If they abscond – jail, no discussion
  • They are taken to various workplaces every day to do something useful that is not a cost as is prison. Use their trades if they have them
  • Try to engage them in working to improve themselves when they leave, capable of doing things they could not do before their offence
  • Give them the opportunity of understanding how to contribute to the community, look after their family better and be a better example to the next generation

Giving people the chance to earn self esteem and feel they are contributing to a  worthy UK is, I believe, the only way we will avoid civil war

8th September 2024 

 

Anyone interested in politics and politicians and how positively ineffective they have become should read ‘Politics On the Edge’ by Rory Stewart

Following is Penguin’s on line summary of a book that gives expert confirmation of many of our suspicions about politicians

Over the course of a decade from 2010, Rory Stewart went from being a political outsider to standing for prime minister – before being sacked from a Conservative Party that he had come to barely recognise.

Tackling ministerial briefs on flood response and prison violence, engaging with conflict and poverty abroad as a foreign minister, and Brexit as a Cabinet minister, Stewart learned first-hand how profoundly hollow and inadequate our democracy and government had become. Cronyism, ignorance and sheer incompetence ran rampant. Around him, individual politicians laid the foundations for the political and economic chaos of today. Stewart emerged battered but with a profound affection for his constituency of Penrith and the Border, and a deep direct insight into the era of populism and global conflict.

Politics On the Edge invites us into the mind of one of the most interesting actors on the British political stage. Uncompromising, candid and darkly humorous, this is his story of the challenges, absurdities and realities of political life. Instantly praised as a new classic, it is an astonishing portrait of our turbulent times.

Read this, read his biographical notes (Wikipedia is very complete) and you may well feel the frustration I feel at the opportunity the Tories and the UK have missed. I don’t agree with everything, he voted ‘remain’ for example, but he should be a major influence in politics. Despite his relatively young years he has experiences and understanding the rest do not have. When bidding for the leadership he made an impression on and his bid was supported by senior Tories such as Ken Clarke and Nicolas Soames and former soldiers like Tobias Elwood and David Gauke. This link is to a short recent interview

https://inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyle/rory-stewart-interview-ready-to-work-for-labour-government-3124278  Not your usual politician!

 

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/442034/politics-on-the-edge-by-stewart-rory/9781529922868

Summary

The searing inside story of our broken politics from the former Cabinet minister and co-host of The Rest Is Politics.

‘The most exceptional political memoir I’ve ever read’
ALAN JOHNSON

‘An instant classic’

 

Reviews

  • There’s no denying that Rory Stewart stands almost alone among British politicians: he’s one of a handful who can actually turn a phrase. That talent is put to good use here — no other account of how Cameron Toryism curdled into May and Johnson is likely to be as evocative or amusing as this one

The Times, *The Times Political Book of the Year*

AGE-FIT NOTE

I think Rory Stewart’s boyish charm is hiding the steel of a real achiever. Now (Oct 30th 2024) is the time the Tories should have fought to get him back. However, I hope REFORM bring him into their fold – that would be a massive counter to some of the negatives that have followed Reform from its early days. I don’t think I would particularly like Nigel Farage as a person but I do admire his direct approach in saying what he thinks or believes. Come on Richard Tice – get hold of Rory Stewart and you have my vote

(Dec 25 2024) – I think he is changing lanes and maybe he is not the hope I thought he could be. What a shame if that is so

Nearly 400 years ago the UK endured a whole decade of civil war caused by greed, ‘haves and have not’s’, religious differences but culminated in a long war that cost more than 200,000 lives

Wikipedia as always provide outstanding description of the wars – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_English_Civil_War

and also of the main characters Charles 1 and Oliver Cromwell. Cromwell so complex I have not made up my mind if he was good or not, and if what he did was good

That’s history – we should be looking at the future. Is it really so complex a problem that we now blunder towards civil war.

Here is a manifesto for the politicians of today

1-THE UNITED KINGDOM IS FOUR COUNTRIES – THE GOVERNMENT WILL CREATE POLICIES THAT BRING THE FOUR TOGETHER FOR EVERYONE’S BENEFIT WHILST RESPECTING THE CULTURAL INDIVIDUALITIES OF EACH ONE

2-THE UK IS A CHRISTIAN COUNTRY. RESIDENTS MAY FOLLOW OTHER RELIGIONS PROVIDED THEY DO NOT CONTRAVENE THE STANDARDS THE UK ACCEPTS, AS FOLLOWS

-THE UK BELIEVES IN THE RIGHTS OF THE FEMALE SEX TO BE REGARDED AS EQUAL TO MALES. IN SOME SPORTS THE PHYSICAL DIFFERENCES REQUIRE SEPARATE MALE AND FEMALE COMPETITIONS

-THE UK ACCEPTS THAT PEOPLE OF THE SAME SEX MAY BE IN LOVE AND WISH TO LIVE TOGETHER

-THE UK ACCEPTS THAT SOME PEOPLE WILL BE MORE COMFORTABLE TO BE REGARDED AS A MEMBER OF THE OPPOSITE SEX – BUT THE UK DOES NOT ACCEPT THAT THEY HAVE CHANGED SEX AND THEREFORE THEY MUST USE THE PUBLIC FACILITIES OF THE SEX THEY WERE BORN IN. THEY CANNOT COMPETE IN SPORTS OF THE OTHER SEX

3-THE UK GOVERNMENT WILL SUPPORT INDUSTRY AND BUSINESS ACTIVITIES THAT WILL PROVIDE EMPLOYMENT TO ITS RESIDENTS, EMPLOYMENT OF A STANDARD TO GIVE THEM FINANCIAL AND JOB SATISFACTION

4-THE UK GOVERNMENT ALLOW TWO LEVELS OF IMMIGRATION I) IMMIGRANTS WHO CAN ADD TO THE QUALITY OF JOBS WHERE THE UK IS UNDERSTAFFED AND II) GENUINE ASYLUM SEEKERS – BOTH UP TO A MAXIMUM NUMBER THAT IS AGREED BY ALL POLITICAL PARTIES

5 – The UK Government will manufacture and buy whatever weapons and equipment it needs in order to be able to defend itself and to assist its allies. Such decisions will be based on Defence professionals’ advice and voting decisions will be cross party


6 – The UK Government offers to accept a charter from a Cross Party Group set up to provide a plan to reorganise the National Health Service that within three years can be proven to be efficient and cost effective

 

 THESE FOUR BASIC COMMITMENTS IF FULFILLED ELIMINATE THE RISK OF CIVIL WAR. IT JUST NEEDS QUALITY GOVERNMENT – OH DEAR!

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