Where Are All The UK’s Medals?

 General  2 Responses »
Aug 012012
 

Anyone would think that there is some sort of drastic failure on the part of the UK’s athletes, given a certain amount of consternation at the current UK medal haul, and with odious examples such as the idiot who chastised Tom Daley for his “failure”.

Perhaps the current medal haul could be better (as of writing, 2 golds, 2 silvers, and 4 bronzes), but those athletes who have not managed a medal up until now (despite expectations) have not failed in the conventional sense of the word. And this is not the old mythical English “It’s not the winning but the taking part that counts” rubbish.

What is easy to overlook is that an athlete who comes fourth in an Olympic competition may have failed to win gold, but has also succeeded in their chosen sport far more than we could. Or to put it another way, fourth best in the world means that someone is on the fourth step of a staircase 6 billion steps high, so that athlete who failed to get gold, silver, or bronze is still so far out of sight of the rest of us that we can’t see him (or her).

It is also easy to overlook that the difference between step 4 and step 3 on that 6 billion step staircase is tiny; sufficiently small that it is easy for an athlete on a less than perfect day to slip down a step or two.

We should be congratulating the UK’s athletes whether they get a medal or not.

And if you are still obsessed with the numbers of medals, look into the total that Europe has obtained as a whole. As a hint, China would not be in the top position.

Flaunt The Flakes!

 General  No Responses »
Jul 302012
 

If you haunt psoriasis self-help sites – which is worth doing if you happen to have it – you will often come across the standard advice of avoiding wearing dark coloured clothing (such as here, here or here). This is obviously to avoid showing up the inevitable skin flakes, and is to some extent quite sensible. After all a flurry of skin flakes cascading down black clothing (as I almost always wear) is not exactly subtle, and will make people wonder if you have something nasty.

And given that most of the damage associated with psoriasis is associated with how we feel society may react to the news we have a loathsome skin condition, it is hardly surprising that people want to hide it.

But perhaps that is the wrong way – perhaps we should be letting the flakes show up, and if people react as if we ought to be wearing sack-cloth clothing, ringing a bell, and shouting “Unclean” as we walk around, then fuck ’em.

Mitt Romney’s Olympic-Sized Blunder

 Politics  No Responses »
Jul 272012
 

No, not that one. His gaffe at criticising the ability of the British people to competently host the Olympic games may be foolish in the extreme. After all the time for such criticisms is not on the eve of the games, but well in advance when things could be done – all his comments have done is demonstrate that he has very little ability in the realm of international diplomacy. And makes it less likely that any British officials will take his more serious comments seriously in the future.

Given the imminent start of the London 2012 Olympic games, it is hardly surprising that everyone has concentrated on this aspect of Romney’s comments. And it certainly points him out as being totally unsuited to any kind of international diplomacy. But another comment also points the way to Romney being unsuited to being a US president; and in some ways is very much more serious.

He also commented on the fact that he had met with the chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (commonly and incorrectly known as MI6), which is a far more serious lapse in judgement that may indicate unsuitability for “domestic” matters as opposed to international matters. His meeting with the head of SiS was hardly top-secret, and the fact that it has been leaked hardly a matter for panic. The common practice of keeping such meetings private is probably more a legacy of SiS very secret existence – up until it was established on a statutory basis in 1994, the British government would refused to comment on any aspect of SiS; even whether it existed or not.

In security terms, you only comment on things that are secret if the benefit of doing so significantly outweighs the advantages of secrecy. Romney’s comments about this meeting indicate that he does not take security seriously; whilst this comment would on the surface would seem to compromise only British security and there in a very small way, his comments are likely to ring alarm bells with any US official involved in security. He would of course deny that his comments reflect a negligent attitude to US national security, and would quite rightly point out that there was no negative impact on US national security.

But it is not what he has revealed, but the fact that he revealed anything at all that indicates his attitude is wrong.

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