Rupert's Read

There is no better time to be thinking about how we can make Norwich a place that doesn't suffer from the depletion of oil   The 'Transition Norwich' group will be holding its 'Great Unleashing' (launch event) at St Andrew's Hall at 7.30 pm this Wednesday evening (Oct. 1st). [See http://www.transitionnorwich.org/  for details.] Speakers at the Unleashing will include Rob Hopkins (who founded Transition Totnes and thus the whole Transition movement, and who I debated on this blog and on his, last year) and local MPs and Councillors. The central part of the Unleashing will be small-group discussions on particular aspects of creating a resilient Norwich. These will include food, transport, buildings, the economy, waste, government, and Heart and Soul. These groups will begin work on developing an 'Energy Descent Plan' for Norwich: working out how Norwich will practically cope with having less fossil fuel energy in the future. I will be atten...

  Norwich councillor Rupert Read, prospective Green Party MEP for East Anglia, today expressed sorrow and sadness at the late night murder of  Frank McGarahan in Norwich City centre (1).  But Dr. Read, a local resident of Norwich, also called for the self-examination of a society in which this vicious act could occur.  He said "Our thoughts today are with the family, friends and workmates of the Mr. McGarahan.  The men who perpetrated this violent act are to be condemned thoroughly and brought to justice. " His murder is symptomatic of a society which has in some cases grown selfish and materialistic in its prosperity.  The greatest honour we could pay the courageous Mr. McGarahan is to prevent similar tragedies ever happening again.  "To prevent incidents like this re-occurring  we also need to examine just why a group of adults in a reasonably wealthy society should feel the need to beat another ma...

Amidst the vast turmoil of today's financial markets, it is funny to see how small are the proposed solutions being put forward by any of the 'main 3' Parties. See http://rupertread.fastmail.co.uk/From%20Limehouse%20to%20Campbell,%20and%20beyond.doc  for my history in one of those Parties; I left the Liberal Democrat Party when Charlie K. took over; and since then, the general thrust of LibDem policy has only been yet further to the 'Right.' The gaping hole in the political spectrum is occupied: by the Green Party. The fundamental problem with the LibDems is that they stand for so little. Clegg is trying to get them to stand for 'liberty'. But this, unadorned, is fundamentally a right-wing idea. The crisis convulsing our planet should make clear to us that it is time for a return to ideology. We need a bold new analysis - a Green New Deal [ http://www.neweconomics.org/gen/z_sys_publicationdetail.aspx?pid=258 ] to tackle peak oil, manmade climate...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/25/conservatives.eu

  Newly formed  AODA, the Anglian Offshore Dredging Association consisting of CEMEX UK Marine, Hanson Aggregates Marine, United Marine Dredging, Volker Dredging Ltd. and Sea Aggregates Ltd are considering a new set of dredging areas off our East Anglian coast. A further large extension (Area 495B) is being sought offshore between Gt. Yarmouth and Lowestoft, to the east of the existing dredging area, and also another new area (Area 496) some ten times that area already being dredged at the existing site off Southwold.  The near edge of this Area 496 is to the west of the existing dredging ground, less than half the distance from the shoreline as the existing dredge site. AODA is holding a 'Public Information Day' on this issue at the Vice Admiral Bar at Great Yarmouth Racecourse THIS FRIDAY, open from 2.00 pm with three 15 to 20 minute presentation sessions to commence at 3 pm, 5 pm and 7 pm. I will be there...

Liftshare is a website where conscientious commuters can easily find like-minded individuals from their local area with whom they can share lifts to and from work each day -- and save lots of money in the process!  It provides the forum in which people can build up social networks, so for those who don't know someone in their immediate social environment who wants to car share, then Liftshare is the answer.  And if for those who already car share, Liftshare can be used to find more people to share with so the costs can be split further still, and CO2 emissions further reduced.   Liftshare has proved to be a successful innovation over the past decade.  They currently have over a quarter of a million members (including me) and over a million trips are registered.  The Green Party has been encouraging more car-sharing to help counter man-made climate change caused by excessive...

I have been asked to give more evidence of the LibDem lurch to the Right. Well, here is a powerful piece of such evidence: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/sep/14/libdemconference.pfi Isn't PFI by definition "cooking the books"?... This is a LibDem sop to the interests of big finance. Isn't this an incredibly ironic moment to choose, to trust the very people who have at the present time brought the world's economy to its knees?!! p.s. And how about this: http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-8935.html And check Scott Redding's apposite _comment_, here: http://www.newstatesman.com/uk-politics/2008/09/labour-party-gordon-change Hard to see a Party happy to have Conference sponsorship from Tesco as anything other than sold out.

Mark Lynas, is getting a lot of page-time and air-time at the moment with his 'iconoclastic' embrace of nuclear power. The funny thing is,  Mark Lynas's  own work already shows why he is wrong to back nuclear power, yet he has somehow missed this... Mark shot to prominence with his wonderful book 'High tide', about how incipient climate chaos is already rendering many coastlines and even entire islands less- or un- inhabitable. Where are virtually all the world's nuclear power stations? At sea level, because of their need for huge amounts of water for cooling... It would be a vast crime, if this generation were to build yet more nuclear power capacity, in places that are in many instances likely to be inundated by rising sea levels, even if we manage to get manmade climate change under control at about 2.5 degrees of over-heat (let alone if we don't...). Mark also fails to mention a huge part of the real solution , that lies in those same...

This is a very interesting release from the impressive new organisation, ECOLOGICAL INTERNET:   _Friends of the Earth Rejects Forest Stewardship Council_ - Major victory for Ecological Internet's campaign to end ancient forest logging as key response to climate and biodiversity crises September 23, 2008 By Earth's Newsdesk, a project of Ecological Internet http://www.ecoearth.info/newsdesk/ Dr. Glen Barry, +1 (920) 664-1965, glenbarry@ecologicalinternet.org (Earth) -- Friends of the Earth (FoE) is the first major international NGO to confirm they no longer support Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification, which falsely suggests primary and old-growth forest logging is desirable and even sustainable. This is a major victory for those including Ecological Internet (EI) and FSC-Watch[1] who have courageously taken on large environmental interests using FSC to greenwash ancient forest destruction. FoE pioneered timber certification during the 1980s and was one ...

Photo call: Rupert Read, prospective Green Party MEP for Eastern Region, will be outside Hinchingbrooke Hospital with members of the Hunts Green Party between 4pm and 4.30pm on Sunday, September 28 and will be happy to speak to journalists.   **********************************************************************************************************   The Green Party's prospective MEP for this region has backed calls to stop Hinchingbrooke Hospital being made into a 'Foundation Trust'.   Rupert Read offered his support to the campaign ahead of a visit to Huntingdon on Sunday (28.9.08) when he will join local party members canvassing homes in Huntingdon.   He said: "Foundation Trusts are simply privatisation under a prettier name. 'New Labour' has continued and accelerated the Conservative betrayal of our National Health Service, privatising it bit by bit while pretending to support it.   "Only the Green Party can be trusted...

Nuclear energy produces 75 only jobs per TWh per year; oil and gas around 250 jobs; wind produces up to 2,400 jobs. If we invest properly in renewables, then we will insure ourselves against unemployment. Yet some nay-sayers say that all this statistic tells you is that wind power is 'inefficient' and that we should be investing in nuclear power stations instead. But what is their definition of efficiency? It is apparently how economical in labour-power an industry is. But that is an utterly bankrupt edition of 'efficiency'. In today's world, we have no shortage of labour-power; what we have a shortage of is oil and gas and climatic space for any more carbon emissions. Relative to those shortages, providing lots of jobs (which is what people want, and gives them an income) is efficient. [Read Herman Daly, if you want to learn more on this.] Except, I guess, if you really want nuclear power, then it is true, you can guarantee lots of jobs: i.e. a never...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/sep/19/ethicalliving.automotive This is a nice bit of joined-up thinking, a devastating rebuttal to anyone who believes that we can keep motoring more and more and not harm ourselves in the process.

If you missed Paxman's mince-meating of Clegg the other night, that I blogged on at the time, then here for added fun is the transcript...: BBC Newsnight, Monday 15 th September   JP        Where are you going to save the £20bn? NC         Well, some of the savings we have already identified. For instance above average income families should not be part of the tax credit system, that would save around £3bn. We've said that the Child Trust Fund that gives a few hundred quid to 18 year olds is money not well spent when it is younger children that need help more. That would save about half a billion. JP         You've already committed that to be spent on more teachers haven't you? That's a previous commitment. NC         No, no, no, the £20bn, let me be quite clear about this, will go towards some of our spending priorit...

Drivers are being urged to leave their motors at home as part of a car-free day. As part of In Town Without My Car! day, an international festival of environmentally friendly transport, families are being encouraged to walk, cycle or catch the bus into Norwich city centre and local towns on Monday. Ahead of the day, Norfolk County Council will hold a stand at the Forum tomorrow offering local travel information, maps and free travel plan advice. People who make a sustainable travel pledge will receive a gift and be entered into a prize draw to win Park and Ride tickets, bicycle locks, bicycle lights and other goodies. Stevie Spencer, the county council's smarter travel choices officer, said: "We will be on hand to offer advice to people who would like to reduce their car use and provide information on other ways they can get around." As part of the scheme, drama group Stopwatch Theatre has been touring schools, putting on a production to encourage pupils to walk, cycle an...

21 September 2008 is Peace One Day, and Norwich councillor and as lead Green Party candidate for MEP for the Eastern Region in the June 2009 Euro-Elections, I have been asked to speak at the big 'Peace one day' event in Norwich. I will be speaking about my long experience in the peace movement, including in peaceful direct action at nuclear weapons installations and at Westminster.   I am very pleased to have been invited to speak at this event because I am passionate about addressing the root causes of all conflicts around the world. I'm a Quaker, and a determined advocate for non-violence and peace all over the globe. I sincerely hope that some day, peace will break out around the world, and not for just one day, but a lasting peace...   Instead of fighting each other in wars over land disputes and oil dependency, we could unite and fight against the one phenomenon which will potentially wipe us all out by...

  What is happening now in the City and in the States sadly vindicates all that we Greens have been saying for so long about money. You cannot trust private banks with the money supply. Allowing these parasites to run the economy is like allowing vultures to run an aviary. The demutualisations of the 80s and 90s are now clearly visible for what they were -- stupid short-termist profit grabs, at the cost of long-term financial security. Your money is pretty much safe in a co-op, a mutual, a state-owned bank or a credit union. But if your money is with the robber-baron private-bankers, then watch out... I had an account with Halifax, when I was growing up. It had a very small amount of money in it. When they demutualised, they closed down my account and simply confiscated that money. That little episode tells you all you need to know about the 'ethics' of standard money-grabbing private banks. The financial system needs to be re-regulated, part-nationalise...

The 20 September 2008 will be a date to be remembered as a momentous occasion for the Green Party in Norfolk for years to come.  The Norfolk Green Party bi-annual General Meeting be held that day (at 10.00 am - get in touch with me if you'd like to come along); it will be the first held in the company of the new Deputy Leader of the Party , one of Norfolk's own, Adrian Ramsay.   In what will be a lively, upbeat affair, we will be building upon the Party's new solid Leadership structure, led nationally by the inspirational and charismatic Caroline Lucas.  With Adrian Ramsay as her Deputy, it is an extremely exciting time for the Green Party in general, and the Norfolk Greens in particular: the next 12 - 18 months will see Ramsay challenge Charles Clarke for the Norwich South seat in the General Election, and June 2009 will see me run for MEP in the Euro-elections here in East Anglia. ...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00df61v Listen again here to my debate with Anthony Grayling last night on Radio 3, on 'humanism'. (It's about 34 minutes into the programme - you can just move the bar at the bottom straight along to it.)   I think the conversation was useful, and certainly fun. In retrospect, however, it seems to me that we were speaking somewhat at cross-purposes in our debate, and don't actually disagree quite as much as we thought we did. For, for Grayling, apparently, humanism is only the sum of all non-supernaturalistic religion. Take for instance the list of philosophers with which Grayling begins: this has little or no unity! This is hardly a tradition. As an alleged ideology, as an 'ism', it cannot possibly be compared with (say) Hinduism or Buddhism; for it is thin gruel indeed. As I said, on the programme: if all that humanism is is the absence of superstition, then I have no beef with it. But that hardly seems to me to...

I am preparing for my debate tonight with A.C.Grayling on humanism on NIGHT WAVES, Radio 3, 9.15 pm. Do tune in!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/7618580.stm   Blue shirt, blue tie... Watch Clegg's new Toryism get mince-meated by Jeremy Paxman.

There are a number of reasons for setting a default speed of 20mph throughout the 'unclassified' road network in residential parts of a city such as Norwich. Most important perhaps is that of driver recognition as to what the speed limit is. If you have 20 mph as the default then you not only establish this limit clearly, but you also adjust the driver's recognition as to what is the "normal" speed in such residential areas. The most important aspect is that drivers set 20 mph as the norm with those 30 mph areas or roads being seen as 50% faster, rather than seeing 30 mph as the norm with 20 mph as 33% slower. The psychological adjustment of normal speeds in residential areas is key to the success of reducing speeds and therefore danger to pedestrians and cyclists. Therefore any trial, pilot or whatever, that only implements 20 mph in a tiny proportion of the city is not modelling 20's Plenty in any realistic manner.   When considering the val...

At tomorrow's meeting of the Norwich City Council Executive, ruling Labour councillors will consider a proposal from council officers to introduce pilot areas of 20mph zones in residential streets, rather than bringing in 20mph zones across all unclassified residential streets in the city at once.   Readers of this blog will be aware that in May the Norwich Highways Agency Committee approved a proposal from me for a blanket 20mph limit. Green Party Councillors including myself are very concerned that the proposal under consideration tomorrow will prove an ineffective, slow and counter-productive way of beginning the introduction of 20mph limits across all residential areas of Norwich. There already exist a number of 20mph zones in Norwich; we cannot see why further 'pilot areas' are necessary.   I have asked the following two qu...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1055829/Lib-Dems-plan-crackdown-immoral-tax-dodgers-save-5billion-year.html Fascinating multiple efforts here by the sinking ship that is the Liberal Democrats to reposition themselves to appeal to 'the Daily Mail vote'... But what I particularly like is the last lines of this article: "Lib Dem MEP Chris Davies warned there would be a stormy debate on the issue [of the LibDems' abandonment of strong commitment to the Euro currency] among delegates tomorrow. 'This is a very good recipe for coming fifth in the European elections,' he said." Indeed; I think that these multiple LibDem U-turns will further increase doubts in voters' minds as to whether the LibDems actually believe in anything at all (except for getting themselves elected). The Green Party actually stands for something: and it would certainly be sweet, and nothing less than just, if we were to beat the LibDems at the European elections n...

Readers of this blog will be aware that I have [reluctantly] abandoned the Obama bandwagon. I was involved with the Dukakis campaign in 88. We could have won that election if Dukakis had capitalised on Bentsen's skewering of Quayle, and had taken the fight to the Republicans, rather than endlessly backing away from their attacks on him. But Dukakis was too afraid: only in the last 10 days of the campaign did he stand up proud and defiant and say, "Yes I am a liberal" -- and from that point onward his poll ratings climbed steadily, but there wasn't enough time left til election day for him to catch up with Bush. I was more peripherally involved with the Clinton-Gore campaign in 92, and worked for a 3rd Party candidate in the Congress during that election. I saw the birth of the New Democrats -- and what a horrible sight it was. The night of the election, I removed my Clinton-Gore bumper sticker, realising that now I would be going instantly into opposition -- but I had...

Wensum ward Green Party Councillor Ruth Makoff has been working with local residents to get repairs carried out on broken electronic timetable displays in several bus shelters on Dereham Road . One fault – on the shelter by Marlpit – has now been repaired after two months of being out of action. Green Councillors believe that the unnecessary delays to the repairs are caused by the work having been contracted out to a private company and they are calling for the work to be brought back under the control of the council when the contract ends in 2011. The fault on the bus shelter in Marlpit that got repaired was a blown fuse that took only 10 minutes to fix, and yet it took two months for the Council to sort out who was responsible and get the problem fixed! This kind of basic thing would be much easier to get right if Norwich had a unitary Council -- so that it was always clear who was responsible for fixing the problem -- and if Council services were brought back 'in...

One of ward Councillor colleagues, Green Councillor Ruth Makoff has been pushing for measures to tackle the problems with litter and flytipping around the Marlpit area, in particular the large quantities of rubbish dumped in the banks between Dereham Road and Jamieson Place, some of which Green Councillors had helped residents litter-pick themselves, earlier this summer, as reported then on this blog . In investigating the issue Ruth discovered that the cleaning of this area had been left out of the CityCare contracts entirely! So that no-one was responsible for keeping it tidy! Councillor Makoff has been assured by council officers that weekly litter picks in the area will start this month .  

http://new.edp24.co.uk/content/news/story.aspx?brand=EDPOnline&category=News&tBrand=edponline&tCategory=news&itemid=NOED11%20Sep%202008%2019%3A56%3A07%3A193

   

To make us choose the lesser of two evils is to try to get us to forget that the lesser of two evils is still -- (an) evil... We must learn from the superb methods and tactics of the Obama campaign, as from the Dean campaign before it -- I have consistently blogged along those lines, below. But what I have also started to blog about more recently is that, in terms of policy content, Barack Obama has changed, and is now a lot less appealing to a Green than he was before. His foreign policy, his gun policy, most crucially perhaps his oil-drilling policy -- this is hardly an agenda that I for one can embrace. To think strategically, one has to stop the rot. One has to stop running to the Right. One has to resolutely resist the allure of being a 'New Democrat' or a 'New Labour'-supporter. One has to start to reclaim the political spectrum. One has to work to _shift_ the political agenda. One has to lead. These are the key lessons of Westen and Lakoff. Obama is,...

Click below to explore an important new experiment in Green Party Blogging... http://greenpartyblogs.org.uk/

So, the Government has decided not to levy a windfall tax on the energy-supply companies [http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/utilities/article4720282.ece ]. No surprise there, given that New Labour always cosies up to big business. But even if they had gone ahead with the type of windfall tax that they were toying with, it would not have been of much use.  The oil companies have been making billions from the oil price rises we have all experienced over the last 12 months. We the people of this country have paid for this, through higher fuel prices, higher food prices and so forth.  The Green Party is calling for us to go now to the source of the vast profits, not merely to the middlemen who supply us in our homes.  It is, after all, the oil companies that are making billions from the oil price rises -- so why shouldn't they take a cut in their profits, to release the money that both we as citizens and Government services urgently ...

  My campaigning to win a seat in the European Parliament next June takes me far and wide across this wonderful East Anglia of our's... Along with Marcus Hemsley of Norwich and local C'llr. James Abbott I did a spot of canvassing yesterday in Witham in Essex, in a ward where there are a couple of byelections on Oct. 2. It was an exciting experience -- we met no-one intending to vote Labour or LibDem, but quite a number of people who were already intending to or soon persuaded to vote for us -- including some previous Tory voters! We met only a couple of diehard Tories. I also met the candidates and local activists, and the whole experience was very positive (and James Abbott's Mum made me a lovely cup of rooibos tea afterward!)...  

This story was in yesterday's _EDP_. Congratulations to my Green Party colleague Andrew Boswell for his detective-like work on this issue, work that is now paying dividends:   http://new.edp24.co.uk/content/news/story.aspx?brand=EDPOnline&category=News&tBrand=edponline&tCategory=news&itemid=NOED08%20Sep%202008%2008%3A26%3A49%3A980   Norwich bypass cost may hit services SHAUN LOWTHORPE 08 September 2008 08:26 Spending on council services in Norfolk could be cut to help pay for the £116m Norwich northern bypass - if the cash cannot be found from elsewhere. Transport chiefs have set out to the government how they would be prepared to fund the 20km road. The county council has earmarked £69m from the east of England 's regional roads funding pot, but still faces a shortfall of nearly £50m. On July 14, the ruling cabinet agreed it would meet any shortfall by borrowing on the open markets. But it has now emerged that, t...

One highlight for me of Green Party Conference this year (from which I am just now back, tired but happy) was the blogging fringe which, I think, went very well indeed. We had a good turnout with around 40 people and a useful discussion about campaigning, blogging to build strategic alliances, fundraising, and so on. Some of us also shared our less happy moments of blogging with one another, including times when we have made serious errors with our blogs... And it was great that the excellent Sunny Hundal of LIBERAL CONSPIRACY ( http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/ ) came along!

[From our post-Conference press release:]   The Green Party Autumn Conference concluded yesterday after a highly successful 4 days at the University Of London. Dr. Caroline Lucas MEP was elected as the first ever Green Party Leader and addressed a packed conference hall on Saturday which responded with loud and prolonged applause to her speach. Dr. Lucas set out the huge opportunities for the Greens in the years ahead - and the stark failure of the other parties to tackle the gathering environmental crisis and the growing gap between rich and poor. She also specifically praised the successes of Adrian Ramsay and of Norwich, and said of Rupert Read: "I can't think of a better people to be our new Green MEPs than Peter Cranie and Rupert Read, in our target regions of NorthWest and Eastern."   On Monday, Cllr. Adrian Ramsay, the newly elected Deputy Leader of the party gave his first address in that role. He launched an attack on privatisati...

Highlights among the media coverage were: On the BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7601832.stm Independent: http://tinyurl.com/5awcgm Press Association: http://tinyurl.com/6x4wrp Norwich Evening News: http://tinyurl.com/5r8egr

The report of an important dispute between Nick Clegg and Lord Rennard has been in the Times: www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article4340213.ece Clegg's response to the piece is here, in the ironically-named 'LibDem Voice' website: www.libdemvoice.org/nick-clegg-writes-for-ldv-making-the-lib-dems-fit-for-the-battle-ahead-3025.html We in the Green Party have a new leadership structure; we have a Leader, are serious about power and are professionalising our Party; but we are not centralist / anti-democratic. The Lib Dems under Clegg are becoming more and more a rightwing party without serious scope for the members to engage and exercise power.   Clegg already has huge leverage over policy (whereas the Green Party Leader is quite properly subject to the will of the party in terms of policy-making which is exercised by its twice yearly conference of members). Now Clegg wants to centralise the Lib Dem organisation too.   I say to Liberal Democrat...

Take five minutes to play East of England 'Transport Trumps'! http://www.bettertransport.org.uk/take_action/transport_trumps/east_england

Sign the petition today http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/keeptradelocal/ I am of course very much hoping to win a seat in June '09 to join the other Green MEPs in Brussels, to join (that is) our other strong champions of small business, especially Caroline Lucas MEP, one of the leading advocates of the economic doctrine of 'localisation', the opposite of gigantism and 'globalisation'.

It has been drawn to my attention by Sunny Hundal that Obama did in fact provide a kind of 'correction' to [the interpretation of] his remarks on East Jerusalem that were widely reported and that I criticised in a blogpost last week (see below). [Goto http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/06/05/obama_backtracks_on_jerusalem.html to see the 'correction'.] This seems to be an improvement. I remain very concerned by Obama's Mid-East policies, by the question of whether his stance on Israel (and on Afghanistan) is any improvement at all on the militarist garbage of McCain; and I remain concerned by his caving on on oil drilling, on gun control, etc. . I am also concerned however by Cynthia McKinney's unwise highlighting of '9-11' conspiracy theories as a part of her Green Party Presidential platform. I am still very much inclined to back her, but am not as 100% as I was. ...Perhaps it is as just as well that what I think is not likely to have a huge ...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7601832.stm Check out Caroline Lucas's interview with Peter Sissons today, after her amazing inaugural Leader's speech that I witnessed this afternoon. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7602157.stm And check out her speech! (There's a nice mention of Eastern Region and of this blogger, 5 minutes into the speech...) --

I'll be blogging more fully on this over at Green Despatches later but, after a frantic evening of twittering (see at below left) last night, here at least also are a couple of key news links: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7601403.stm  [Watch Caroline's speech here!] [And here is a good local story on Adrian's victory:] http://new.edp24.co.uk/content/news/story.aspx?brand=EDPOnline&category=News&tBrand=EDPOnline&tCategory=News&itemid=NOED05%20Sep%202008%2022%3A43%3A26%3A130 --   Rupert Read Green Party Councillor, Norwich, and Lead Candidate for Eastern Region for the Greens in the 2009 Euro-elections. Why not try my BLOG, 'Rupert's Read': http://rupertsread.blogspot.com See also www.oneworldcolumn.org [for my regular op-ed journalism] I TWITTER. DO YOU? Check out my frequently-updated, mobile-phone-based MICRO-BLOG, at http://twitter.com/RupertRead

As I've remarked here before, but perhaps I haven't put the point strongly enough: Barack Obama has lost the good will of Muslims around the world already. He needs to keep -- now, to regain -- this good will, if he is to have a chance of not making the same mistakes as Bush has made and that McCain would make. People who support the Palestinians (including me -- and international law!) believe of course that East Jerusalem and the West Bank are being held illegally by Israel. Barack Obama stated that he supported a Middle-East settlement that meant Israel would keep the WHOLE of Jerusalem forever ... WE WONT EVER ACCEPT THAT. See these BBC News webpages for more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi /world/middle_east/7450000 .stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi /world/americas/7437060.st m

  A meeting is being held at Lound Parish Hall today [at 7.30], Thursday 4th September for all Parish Councillors and Clerks from: Ashby, Blundeston & Flixton, Carlton Colville, Corton, Gisleham, Herringfleet, Lound, Oulton, Somerleyton and Hopton. [The purpose of the meeting is to give all the Parish Councillors the opportunity to learn about the Boundary Committee proposals and about various Parties' views of them, before returning to their respective Parishes to discuss the proposal and submit their views to the Committee.]   In my speech to the meeting I will be stressing the commitment of Norwich and Norfolk Green Parties to local government and to resisting any drive towards centralisation / toward overly large administrative areas for local government. This implies very strong reservations about the 1- or 2- or 3- unitary models currently being proposed for Norfolk (and Lowestoft ).   The Green Party strongly believes that Lowestoft ...

http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2008/09/03/the-true-tory-colours-come-out/ Around the blogosphere and in the press, a number of British right-wing commentators (notably Peter Hitchens and Iain Dale ) have already come out in support of McCain’s VP pick Sarah Palin. It is good to see these Tories lining up in support of her. It makes pretty clear just how skin-deep the Cameron ‘revolution’ has been. Let’s remind ourselves of some of what Palin stands for: * Palin opposes abortion even in the case of rape or incest. She believes, that is to say, in (for example) the right of a father who rapes his under-age daughter legally to ensure that his daughter bears his grandchild. Yes: Palin believes that rapists and incestuous predators have the right to see their babies sired, as long as they succeed in forcing conception. (Her 17 year-old unmarried daughter Bristol is pregnant ); Palin would insist on the law forcing Bristol to take the baby to term, whoever its father was, whatever the c...

I won't be blogging as much as usual here at R's R in the next several days: instead, you can find me over at http://greendespatches.blogspot.com/ , blogging Green Party Conference!

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/caroline-lucas On leadership, and the Green New Deal... Do check it out!

New Orleans shouldn't breathe a sigh of relief prematurely - here come Hanna and Ike. This is a truly dreadful hurricane season. Expect more like it, in coming years...   http://uk.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUKN0133098020080901   Yes, the message is: Vote Green or the planet gets it...  And that means: the humans get it...   [Are we getting this yet? ... ]  

  For the second year running, melting of the sea ice in the Arctic is at record levels. Manmade climate change is causing the ice area to fall and the ice depth to thin.     Scientists predicted just a few years ago that the North Pole would be ice free in summer - but not until 2070. The current loss of summer ice suggests it could be much sooner.   Once summer sea ice disappears, the Arctic will warm even faster - a "feedback" effect as white reflective ice is replaced by dark absorbing ocean.   Whilst melting sea ice does not raise sea levels, melting land ice does. The biggest threat is the isolation of Greenland. Surrounded by warming ice-free seas in summer, the land based ice cap will melt faster. If the Greenland ice cap were to go completely, global sea levels would rise about 20 feet.   The melting of the Greenland ice cap would place East Anglia increasingly at risk from major coastal flooding - bo...