Socialism is Jeremy Corbyn in Number 10 plus superfast broadband! Okay, not as pithy as Lenin's definition involving soviet power and electrification, but John McDonnell's speech on Wednesday is a continuation of a fine tradition in left and centre left politics: the close alignment of our policy agenda with technological dynamism. Though, of course, it's more than just a nice rhetorical flourish - the lining up alongside futurity in John's case has a double purpose. His iPads and Socialism speech was an attempt to wrest the white heat of technology from the grip of George Osborne, who's made much of his fetish for graphene and high speed rail; and to bring out the shiny contours of contemporary left Labourism against the soot-streaked brutalism of nationalisations past. While John is often portrayed as a wild-eyed Bolshevist burning with the ambition to collectivise the FTSE 100, his speech contained very little that might suggest expropriating the expropriators is on his mind. Still, city slickers might get a bit angsty over his desire to do something with the huge piles of cash big business are sitting on. This graph from Michael Roberts demonstrates the problem:
How to unlock this cash? John said Britain needs to look at "ways to change our corporate tax system and work constructively with companies to give them the incentives to invest wisely ... a higher tax on retained earnings should be investigated." That seems quite reasonable to me and anyone not ideologically committed to stuffing the maws of corporate accounts with even more gold in the hope that someone, somewhere will invest as per Osborne's illiterate and dysfunctional long-term economic plan. Some might take this as evidence of Labour's anti-business stance, though being super business-friendly has never stopped the Tories enunciating such. Yet, again, what is on offer here isn't socialism as such but rather a kinder, fairer capitalism. As John notes, what he's seeking is a "compact" between government, business, and science to plan for growth. This would mean addressing skills gaps in increasingly crucial sectors, turning attention to the threats and promises of automation, as well as providing a context for more profitable investment. Think of it as capitalism as if rationality mattered. And, as you might expect, John takes a swipe at the idiocy of Osborne's austerity. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Putting aside the PLP froth and different approaches to matters of terrorism and war, economically speaking a great deal unites Labour. Compare John's scheme with the more "mainstream" vision outlined by Liam Byrne. I don't think there are differences of kind here, merely of degree and emphasis. Unfortunately, our opponents are aware of this even if we're not, and will say and do anything to keep the political focus away from the economy - even when there's a spending review imminent.
Okay, I read quite a bit. I'm not a full on book snob, but thanks to reading so much and working randomly through the huge pile of novels we've accumulated over the years, when something stands out I know it has to be good. And that's just happened reading The Magus by John Fowles. Being at once highly educated yet appallingly ignorant, I knew the book had a good reputation, but in the manner of Paul Coehlo's The Alchemist has a following. Anticipating some semi-mystic wittering common among the more esoteric offerings of the 1960s and 70s, The Magus took those expectations and fed them into the shredder. It also turns out that The Magus is pretty impossible to review. What Fowles has given us is a novel that plays with coming-of-age tropes, tragic love affairs, and detective stories, but also throws in Greek myth, psychoanalysis, Nazis, Shakespeare, hypnosis. It's difficult to say anything that doesn't spoil the book in some way, except to say the whole thing is a rabbit hole that draws you in deeper and deeper. Once you're satisfied with one explanation for the goings ons, it's upended and the mystery rewrites itself. In this respect it reminded me a bit of Lost, without losing itself in the complexity of the plot. In literature, the nearest it comes to is probably Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco, though Fowles' novel is more accessible and satisfying. Because it questions the extent to which one can rely on one's own perceptions, sense-making, and intentions, The Magus has lazily been described as a postmodern novel. This is a bit of retrospective padding. Given its concerns with the mind and the unconscious, and its darting twists and unexpected - and sometimes absurd - set-pieces, The Magus is a culmination of surrealist themes the postmodern later drew upon. Call me a proselytiser, but it's not often a novel really grabs me. This one has. Get it. Read it.
A week ago one of the most controversial figures ever to have graced Stoke-on-Trent politics left the stage. I'm referring to John van de Laarschot, the now ex-chief executive of the six towns' beloved City Council. For a council officer supposed to remain in the shadows, he was certainly one of the best known unelected city servants ever to have held office. It almost got to the point where he was a household name. Rare are the occasions the chief executive of the local authority makes front page news of the local rag. In this one respect, Stoke was unique. JvdL, as he was often referred to down the council, was appointed in October 2009 by the then governing coalition of City Independents and Tories. However, as the bulk of his time with the city was under the 2011-15 Labour administration, he was most closely identified with our party. His appointment came at a time of acute instability at the council. A year before his appointment, Stoke-on-Trent had decided to scrap the mayoralty by referendum (contemporary piece here). And this was after a long period of bloody and dysfunctional infighting in the council chamber. Equally as chaotic were the musical chairs in the upper echelons of the civic centre as senior officers came and went. On top of this then, as now, the city's economy was in what might be euphemistically described as a challenging position. Stoke needed a hero on a white charger, and JvdL was sold as that man. This is the first curiosity around JvdL. Having previously served as chief executive of Torridge District Council - an authority hardly known for a resurgent economy - somehow convinced leading councillors he was a superstar chief executive. The three feathers in his cap that helped was improving the finances of the North Devonshire borough, experience as a senior manager at PepsiCo, and a stint on Wife Swap. What can I say? Some folks are easily impressed. JvdL started on £194k/year, which rose to £230k after increments were applied. And there were various golden handcuff clauses and guaranteed payouts if he was let go early. Fair play to his canny negotiating skills - shame on the coalition's abysmal fools who nodded this idiocy through. By the time Labour came to office it was too late to dismiss him under employment law. And besides, things appeared to be changing. Anticipating a Labour victory, under his direction officers had beavered away on Mandate for Change, which was something approaching a long-term economic plan for the city. To some fanfare the council announced the red carpet was getting rolled out for business. Local employers were wined and dined, potential inward investors charmed and smarmed. The city centre-first strategy (rightly) affirmed. Overall, there was an impression of movement, of things starting to happen. Having attended a number of City Council soirees back in the day, JvdL certainly looked the part. He presented himself and the city he ran confidently and not without an element of aplomb. He was a showman with the kind of business charisma managers and investors would have found compelling. Nevertheless, he was constantly dogged by his humongous salary, a sum that went down like a yard of sick in a city not known for its overgenerous wage earnings. There was that and a question of what he actually did. I remember one councillor telling me about going to him with some numbers to which he replied "I don't do detail". His subordinates were likewise mystified. There were lots of meetings. And meetings with consultants he'd previously had associations with, but little idea what he did on a day-to-day basis. What is it you can do to justify such a massive wad? His leadership was also lacking in certain parts of the council. The so-called sexy stuff in local government is always around infrastructure and regeneration. Adult and children's social care, not so much. The feeling down the civic was that JvdL was very much a regen manager - the rest was left to his mixed bag of lieutenants who, like most councils, ranged from the scarily competent to the terrifyingly clueless. Now John has gone, is the council better for his tenure? In some respects it's a more professional outfit. A leaner one, certainly, thanks to the ceaseless barrage of cuts. But still dysfunctional in many respects. The jobsworth culture, the uncaring culture, the working-in-silos culture - features common in all large organisations, public and private - wasn't really addressed. As for the regen strategy associated with his time, well, we'll never know if it's set to bear fruit seeing as the City Idiots and their Tory helpers have junked it. I don't think JvdL was worth the cash, but because of their stupidity and petty-mindedness, we'll never know for sure.
It used to be said that the lowest form of solidarity was signing a petition. Now you might argue that it's changing your social media avatars so they reflect the topical campaign of the month. It is with this jaundiced and sceptical eye that Camilla Hodgson reviews the phenomenon of millions of people giving their social media a Tricolore filter in solidarity with the French people against last Friday's attacks. In his Economic Theory of Democracy (1957), Anthony Downs argued that the propensity to vote was an outcome of the probability one's vote is decisive (P) in a given electoral contest taken with the perception that one benefits from your chosen party winning over and above opposing parties (B), minus the cost of voting (C). Both Conservatives and Labour heavily played the PB themes at the last election, each painting the other in blood-curdling terms and aggressively chasing every vote. And because the polls were close, parties and commentators alike expected a much higher turnout. In the end, the latter was up by a blip, and Labour was trounced as bits of its (former) support stuck to UKIP or stayed at home (among other reasons). From the Downsian perspective, the PB-C formula* played out as Labour voters in sufficient numbers thought their vote didn't matter, that there weren't enough incentives on offer from their party, and the cost of ploughing through party literature, watching political broadcasts and TV debates, and finally going out to vote were too high for too many. What's this got to do with the price of social media filters? Adapted to the world of tweets and Facebook updates, and doing some injury to Downs' formulation, everyone knows filtering one's avi through the colours of the Republic isn't going to have a meaningful impact on the world. Yet demonstrating one's opposition to IS in a way that is cost free makes some sort of sense. The benefit of being seen as a caring soul touched by awful events does not see one benefit materially, except in the sense of signalling one's virtue. That, at least, is how a rational choice approach might explain why an ocean of red, white, and blue has taken over the internet. And, as such, it shows up the limits of its utility. Everyone here is self-motivated and self-interested, expressions of solidarity and support have an undercurrent of bad faith. It does not recognise that people can be genuinely moved by tragedy. Looking at my Facebook updates, which contains some real people as opposed to the politics weirdos I follow on Twitter, folks ranging across the spectrum of politicisation, from the heavily committed to couldn't-give-two-hoots demonstrated their solidarity and sympathy. And, undoubtedly why it was closely felt in ways the atrocities in Lebanon and Kenya just weren't - unfortunately - is cultural proximity. Most people don't know a great deal about France, French politics, or French society, but they know enough that they are like us. Hence it's very easy to imagine being at the footy, sinking a jar or two down the bar, enjoying a gig and facing the sort of nightmare Paris has been through. Among the outpouring of pity and sadness, as well as rage against the IS death cult, there is a tinge of fear in there as well, that this could be visited upon a British city. To return to Camilla's New Statesman piece, the point of filtering your avatar is ... well, it varies. There is no point as such, and if there is a consequence it is to strengthen the social bonds, to create a shared emotion; a 'we' in a highly varied, digitally individuated world - just as it is with other outbreaks of social media solidarity. *Any resemblance between this formula and the arrangement of my own initials are entirely coincidental.
You can understand the thirst for vengeance. Last night, France flew sorties over Syria to strike IS targets in Raqqa, the capital of their ramshackle semi-state. They reportedly hit a recruitment centre and munitions depot. Other facilities on the receiving end of French ordinance were a hospital, a museum, a stadium, and a chicken farm. Still, "something" has been done. IS have had a taste of fire, even if civilians every bit as innocent as the murdered in Paris lost their lives in the French bombing. Whenever there is an appalling outrage on Western soil, or mass civilian casualties mount overseas, as per the Tunisian beach murders or the bombing of a Russian airliner, politicians and media outlets combine their outrage with simple non-solutions that paint one half of the world in saintly white and the other in sinner's black. The complexity of the situation, of the drives that fuel IS support here and abroad, which few establishment figures are normally interested in anyway, are painted out. They're against us, so let's kill 'em. Alas, turning Raqqa and parts of Sinai and Yemen into the Moon will kill terrorists, but does nothing to address the causes of terrorism. Such is the folly of dressing ourselves in saintly white as against their sinner's black. At times likes these, pointing out the bleeding obvious can at best be seen as an eccentricity. At worst, nuance is tantamount to flying the IS standard. This in mind, I wouldn't like to think some in the media have been waiting to turn the Paris tragedy into an opportunity to attack Jeremy Corbyn, but it would appear some were lying in wait to use the occasion to attack Jeremy Corbyn. Some were a bit quick off the mark, while others waited to see what Jez had to say. And so, tonight, after saying a shoot-to-kill policy on the streets of Britain is not a good idea. Cue outrage. Let's be clear what a shoot-to-kill policy is and isn't. What it isn't is police getting into gunfights with armed terrorists, as per what happened in Paris. That is an armed response to an emergency situation and anyone in the commission of a terrorist outrage can expect to be held to account by a hail of bullets. That is, first and foremost, a police operational matter of which there is oversight after the fact. What a shoot-to-kill policy is is the gunning down of suspects. Not someone already attacking civilians. Not someone in a gun fight with police. So when Jeremy says he's against a shoot-to-kill policy, he's being highly specific. He's not suggesting armed response throw down their arms and risk themselves and civilian lives to lay the cuffs on someone spraying all and sundry with gunfire. What he is suggesting is that shooting people first and asking questions later, is something we might want to avoid. And you know what? He's wise to make this call. In the aftermath of the July bombings 10 years ago, as the police were on edge and London as a whole jittery, in a catastrophic failure of intelligence Jean Charles de Menezes was wrestled to the floor of a tube carriage and shot four times in the head by police. Do we want to see a repeat, really? The spin, however, is very different. Jeremy would have us fight terrorists with tea and a slice of muesli, the editorials and front pages will say tomorrow. Like I said, if there are barrels to scrape there are plenty willing to reach deep into them and, again, the tragedy is that another moment to think creatively about and ask searching questions about the jihadi imagination and why some disaffected Muslim youth turn to IS will surely be lost.
Near the beginning of the year I had to write about a set of Paris attacks, and as it comes to a close here we are again. As 129 innocent people lie dead thanks to the cowardly actions of self-styled warriors of Allah, the awful shock is tempered by a world-weary inevitability, a sense that something like the Charlie Hebdo massacre was always going to happen again. And again. And again. For the murderous thugs and zealots of IS, there is no out-of-bounds, no target too soft to be the object of an outrage, but to defeat them the powers ranged against IS can't carry on as they have been doing. Here are some scattered thoughts on military "hard" power, and the crucial importance of the "soft". 1. Up until now their jerry-rigged caliphate in Iraq and Syria has concentrated Islamists from across the globe. For the thousands of volunteers pulled in from Western Europe and North America, there's a place on the map they can go; an imagined community of small minds for whom medievalism backed by selective Qu'ranic verse is their vision of heaven on earth. Here they can live out their brutalised fantasies against defenceless Yazidi, or pretend domestic bliss under self-ordained Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Now that its supply lines from Turkey are under regular attack by the Russians, no matter how attractive IS territory may appear to the jihadi imagination, getting there is much more difficult. As the siege ratchets up and their pocket of territory contracts, that leaves more would-be fighters in the West available for operations like yesterday's outrage. Perversely, as IS weakens in its stronghold the capacity for (semi-autonomous) terror attacks in the West become more potent. 2. Nevertheless, there are military options. The blood price paid by Russian tourists and pleasure-seeking Parisians has redrawn the complex alignments in Syria, again. Francois Hollande and Vladimir Putin are on the same page and, understandably, there's probably a unanimity of public opinion across Europe against Islamism. Who wouldn't want to see IS perish beneath a whirlwind of bombs? The danger of entanglements between Western and Russian aircraft in Syrian skies has receded and a unified response is now, for the moment, possible. But as an objective, given the above, is it possible and desirable? First of all the crushing of IS cannot be accomplished by upping the number of sorties flown. It requires troops, and is there any appetite that same public opinion to put Western and Russian soldiers in harm's way? Is that even the case in a France raw with grief? It's unlikely. However, there are already troops on the ground who are proving effective against the Islamists. The problem is there's not enough of them, and Turkey are intent on bombing them behind their lines. If the West/Russia are not intent on fielding soldiers against IS, they're going to have to cut a deal with the Kurds and offer them more than the present alliance of convenience between them and the US State Department. If, however, the unthinkable happens and ground troops are sent against IS, as much as the latter would relish the fight the modern firepower and well-trained forces France, Russia, and Britain have at their disposal shouldn't have too much trouble rooting out and destroying IS. IS aren't going up against the ramshackle Iraqi army, and neither would the great powers be facing a well-motivated indigenous insurgency as per Basra and Helmand. Were IS to be eradicated from their homeland, it might, might, rob IS sympathisers elsewhere of a focus and demonstrate the futility of their impoverished politics. If not here, where? If not now, when? What's the point if your efforts are doomed to perish? Then again, their bit-part theology is hardly conducive to rational thought. Its other-worldly orientation can easily adapt itself to life without the so-called caliphate and alibi terrorism for terrorism's sake. And, of course, pasting IS territory with bombs isn't very likely to well-dispose civilians to the West, threatening a renewed cycle of radicalisation and violence. 3. Speaking on BBC News this lunch time, Lord Carlile - the so-called terrorism expert - called for Muslim leaders and young Muslims to come forward and be more forthright in their condemnation. What on earth does he think they have been doing? British mosques regularly ring out with denunciation against Islamic State and extremism. There are plenty of Muslims making plain their opposition to fundamentalist terrorism. Should Carlile pause before speaking ill-informed bollocks in future, perhaps he might like to reflect why the Muslim voices the media much prefers to give national platforms to are unrepresentative self-publicists like the rancid Anjem Choudary, or dishonest frauds like Mo Ansar. Where's the call for the media to act responsibly and reflect the popular opinion of British Muslims? Your voice can only carry so far if the press and the broadcasters are utterly uninterested in what you have to say. And here is the problem the political and security establishment refuse to confront. While it is crass and stupid to say the West is to blame for Islamist extremism, radicalisation doesn't happen in a vacuum. It's not as if young Muslims stumble on propaganda videos and are turned into hate-filled zealots on the basis of IS battle images or pictures of fighters with kittens. They appeal to some because they seize on real grievances and work on them. Every time there is an Islamist outrage, Muslims are targeted in sporadic revenge attacks by far right thugs, are blamed by politicians and media figures, and told in no uncertain terms that they must integrate better. Often times, the need for terror is surplus to requirements - politicians and the media froth away anyway. A perception that Muslims are treated as second class citizens at home is repeated by what happens abroad. Contrast the sensitive and humanising coverage the Paris victims have - rightly - received with Palestinians murdered by Israelis, civilians killed by US drone attacks, or people blown apart by suicide bombs in Baghdad or Beirut. The second class status of Muslims is perpetuated in the way the tragedies befalling the Muslim world are covered. Is it any wonder that some might find themselves alienated from official society? That a rational kernel wrapped in an IS shell can cut through and mobilise a very small minority of disaffected young Muslims? IS themselves are well aware their appeal lies in this tension, and their terrorist actions are designed to exploit it. Attacking soft targets puts European Muslims in general under pressure by the media, by the security apparatus, by the populist and far right. Nothing would suit IS more if the Paris attacks are followed by waves of arson and violence and, in five weeks time, a good election result for the Front National. It also helps explain why Friday's killers had fake Syrian passports - the more antipathy that can be stirred up against Muslim refugees, the more the West's human rights rhetoric are exposed as hypocrisy, the greater the pool from which IS can recruit. Bombing IS and destroying them on the battlefield might stamp them out in the short-term, but for as long as grievances are fed there will be people ready and more than willing to exploit them. Injuncting Muslims to sort themselves out is not going to disperse the jihadi imagination. British society, French society, Western society has to look at itself and address the mainstream practices and inequalities that can turn small numbers of marginalised populations into vicious, hate-filled mass murderers.
Is the Labour Party divided? Of course it is. But divided doesn't necessarily mean at each others' throats, at least some of the time. As divisions have been the theme of the week, it's time to quickly cast one's eye over the Parliamentary Labour Party and discern what groups are emerging among this most august of bodies. 1. The 4.5%ers These aren't everyone who backed the blessed Liz, but rather the headbangers that outright refuse to reconcile themselves to the new regime. Caution was thrown to the wind long ago as all that matters is the removal of Jeremy and all his works. The chief offender, of course, is our friend Simon Danczuk. While, wisely, other 4.5%ers put clear water between him and them, his behaviour exemplifies everything this tendency stands for. An over-inflated sense of self-importance, a conceit that he uniquely knows what Labour people want, a deeply impoverished political imagination, and absolutely no interest in seeing the party do well. He fires off his well remunerated Mail on Sunday column each week with broadsides aimed at the new leadership and, by extension, the majority of members who voted for him, and he's uninterested in fighting the factional fight. This is his opportunity to make a name and, more importantly, some cash. After all, he's going to have a hefty bill to foot once the Child Support Agency catch up with him. While not as plainly self-serving as Danczuk, the rest of the 4.5%ers seem utterly lost. They have no strategy for taking back the party, so they're reduced to ill-judged remarks and cack-handed interventions that almost appear designed to alienate potential supporters. Remember, these are the people styling themselves as the election-winning specialists - and they can't even get building support - the most basic of factional ABC's - right. 2. The Corbyn Sceptics Probably the largest section of the PLP, the sceptics believe Labour doesn't have a hope winning with the present leadership. Unlike their 4.5% compadres, with whom they may share many political positions and basic outlooks, they have the strategic sense to realise that if the party is going to be won back over, the game ahead is long. There is no strategy as such, yet, but one is beginning to emerge. Liam Byrne's speech was the first proper, thought out intervention in this area. He articulated a critique of Corbynomics while stipulating an alternative that was not neoliberal (indeed, its death was proclaimed), nor as left as Jeremy's plans, but nonetheless a coherent and much more preferable alternative to the thin gruel served up by Dave and Osborne. And this is the right tack to take. When your politics have been routed, the road back means winning the intellectual battle and forging a vision. I would expect similar pitches from a variety of figures in the coming months as the proliferation of groupings like Red Shift and Labour Together set out their manifestos. Yet at the same time, this collection of MPs are not happy with the antics of the 4.5%. Whatever they do is bound to reflect on them. Because it was Blairites - in the main - who defied the whip over Osborne's budget surplus stunt, the rest get tarred with the same brush, even though the bulk of them remained loyal. This group know that they need to charm the members and win the battle of ideas. Open opposition and outright destabilisation is but a recipe for a future 'stab in the back' myth, should Jeremy be seen not to deliver election victories. And we know from history how powerful that kind of story can be. Careful, careful, is the Sceptics' watchword. 3. The Go-With-The-Flows There is some travel between this group and the sceptics. They might be critical of Jeremy and, likewise, believe he's not going to win an election, but are cogniscent of the fact that he is the memberships' choice (since swelled by tens of thousands of Corbyn supporters) he deserves a fair crack of the whip. Andy Burnham, Angela Eagle, Tom Watson, and Hillary Benn, despite their public disagreements with Jeremy, are probably the leading figures of this tendency within the PLP. They will continue to state their own positions, but are highly unlikely to lead a rebellion or organise opposition. If you like, these are "proper party people" who, whatever you might think of them, believe the party comes first and will acquit their duties accordingly. The relationship between this group and Corbynism is quite complex. Sceptical, yes, but they recognise that the huge influx of new members presents an opportunity for the party to renew itself. While some of this wave will dissipate in time, particularly those for whom politics is a keyboard as opposed to a physical pursuit, they believe experience will moderate their views - and this is more likely if the PLP has a constructive as opposed to antagonistic relationship with the new arrivals. 4. The Corbynistas The smallest group of all, of course. Yet their weakness is backed by their huge majority among the membership and, so far, my summer prediction that this reality would act as a disciplining mechanism on the PLP has borne out. Whether this will be the case should Labour be afflicted by poor election results and dogged by dismal polling remains to be seen. That said, it's hard to imagine Jeremy stepping down any time between now and 2020. After all, it's not every day the Labour left capture the party's leadership.
Or not. Ever since the election of Jeremy - and before - there has been whispering that the Gorgeous One, George Galloway will make a triumphant return to Labour. Ever since his expulsion from the party for "bringing it into disrepute" for suggesting that soldiers should disobey orders given by officers, it's no secret that is has held out for a return. That is despite running against the party on a number of occasions, and - in 2005 and 2012 - winning two Parliamentary seats from it. There has always been an uneasy feeling among a section of the membership that a return was never ruled out. The rumour mill ground out more nervous jitters last week with Ken Livingstone stating that Galloway should be allowed to return. Was he speaking from the heart are indulging some unlicensed kite-flying? No matter, at Monday's PLP meeting, members of that august body stated in no uncertain terms that he shouldn't be allowed back - a position apparently shared by the leader. Long before the disgraceful campaign Galloway waged in Bradford to try and keep Naz Shah at bay, and his unconscionable comments in support of the rape charge-dodging Julian Assange, at best he was a Marmite figure. Galloway is undoubtedly a man of oratorical gifts and a charisma that charms and rubs people up the wrong way equally, and is capable of soaring triumphs and crashing lows. Witness his bravura performance in front of the US Senate, and how quickly that political capital was pissed away months later. Oh what fun was had watching the SWP twist and turn to defend his Celebrity Big Brother antics - remember, this was before their ugly falling out with everyone else in Respect. Though why does Galloway inspire fear and loathing right across the left political spectrum, what is it about the man that brings forward a rare united front ranging from (some) Trots to Progress types? Part of it has to be rooted in his highly critical and uncompromising position on Israel, one that does not recognise its right to exist. Just as some Stalinists of old took the mildest criticism of the USSR as blackest blasphemy, so criticising the less savoury aspects of Israeli society - not least the occupation - is beyond the pale for some. But there are plenty of lefties like that (including the leader). What truly inspires a visceral reaction against old Gorgeous is not so much the blindspot toward nominally anti-imperialist movements and dictators, but their whole-hearted embrace. Whether it be chumming up to figures in Ba'athist Iraq, his unapologetic appearances on Iran's Press TV and Russia Today, his opportunistic courting of communalism to get elected, the soft-soaping of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Assad, and effectively putting pluses wherever the Western foreign policy establishment put a minus, for many the values Galloway professes to cherish at home are abandoned when it comes to matters abroad. It makes him look like an opportunist. A charlatan. There are worse people than Galloway presently in the Labour Party, but worse for entirely different reasons. That said, letting George back into the party sends an entirely wrong message, that it's okay to give enemies of labour movements everywhere a free pass if they're episodically opposing interests set against our own, and - yes - that it's okay to indulge sexist abuse if the cause, in George's case a re-election campaign, is deemed just enough. Galloway is fine where he is. He seems happy doing his thing outside the Labour Party, and we're doing just fine ticking over without him.
It's fair to say Sega's humble 8-bit system didn't have many stand-out classics that have echoed down the decades in the same way as the Nintendo Entertainment System had, but here's one of them. Hitting the shelves way back in 1988, Phantasy Star was Sega's me too answer to a plethora of role-playing games released for Nintendo's machine. Save the Zelda franchise (which, in my opinion, is an action/arcade adventure rather than RPG), Phantasy Star was a real step over the likes of Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy, and laid the groundwork for the sub-genre now known as Japanese RPGs. I never encountered this game upon its release. Then I was high in Spectrum heaven, while my Master System-owning mate was only really interested in arcade stuff like Rampage and Thunderblade. But years later I picked up the third game in the series, the (now maligned) Phantasy Star III, which I played to death over the course of a summer. More of that on another occasion, but PSIII introduced me well to the universe in which the series is set, as well as the combat system and game structure. Hence when I finally got round to Phantasy Star proper it was like revisiting an old, kindly friend.
Phantasy Star on the surface doesn't look too special. You guide your player character around on overworld, dropping into towns for shopping and quest hints, and nipping into dungeons to find treasures and advance the plot. There's more to it. First off, and very rare for the time, the star lead of Sega's RPG flagship was Alis, a woman. Yikes! She is pulled into a vengeance quest against Lassic, a formerly benevolent ruler-turned-dark who reigns over the three planets of the Algol star system. Lassic had previously crushed an uprising led by Nero, Alis's brother, and the game begins with his expiration and her oath to crush her brother's nemesis. Over the course of the game, Alis meets and adds further characters to her party - Myau, a proto-Pikachu, Odin - a well-meaning axe-wielding meat head, and Noah, the game's resident magic user. The second innovation: JRPGs regularly blend magic and high technology, but this was the first game to do it. You shuffle about the game world taking on monsters with swords, claws, axes, and staffs. And you can also acquire light sabres, laser guns and enchanted weaponry. Third, as this is a multi-planet system there are actually three game worlds. To start off with you buy passage on a ship to visit the desert world, and later you acquire a ship of your own to allow access to a third, ice planet. All have to be visited multiple times to explore the towns and the dungeons. And that's the fourth - breath-taking - innovation. All the dungeons are rendered in three dimensions. It's simple but looks absolutely stunning - even better than the overhead dungeon sections that afflicted its 16-bit sequels. In short, there was nothing on the NES that could hold a candle to it. It's just a shame it didn't help shift Master Systems in massive numbers, nor at the time was it particularly well-regarded in Europe. A pity, because it plays well and there are hours of exploring to be had. A true classic, in other words.
Yet, for all its innovations, it rested on staples which, by 1988, were already very well-established conventions. Like table top RPGs of old, characters had levelling systems. Combat was by the random throw of virtual dice, albeit heavily modified by increasing one's combat-related attributes, and to become more powerful you had to grind. i.e. Wander around world maps/dungeons to fight monsters, carry off their cash and items for powerful weaponry and/or vehicles, and accumulate experience points so one becomes tougher and stronger. It's long been noted in the critical study of video games that these sorts of mechanics are congruent with the neoliberal sensibility of the times. Beating a game is about accumulating material and experiential resources, as in-game capital of one type that can be traded in for in-game capital of another. Trips out into the wilderness become less about questing and more about repeating simple abstract processes. Except this time it's not about the seeking of ephemeral experiences to pad the game out - grinding is accumulation for accumulation's sake. You can never be too hard or too tough for the nasties Phantasy Star - and other JRPGs - throw at you. While you might argue it's difficult to understand how the mechanics of an RPG can work without a numbers system underpinning it, the game works to normalise the planning and execution of accumulation strategies semi-independently of the tightly-structured story (being an early JRPG, there are no side-quests to speak of). It simulates and inculcates habits that underpin actually existing economic relationships. Neoliberal sensibilities also work on the surface of the game as well. As you walk your way through the three worlds, you get a sense of how sparse they are. Considering you're part of a space-faring civilisation, towns are few and far between and they're sparsely populated. You visit and very little, if anything, changes between trips. An area might have been unlocked because of actions taken elsewhere, but the same people stand around in the same places and have exactly the same snippets of information to say. True, there was only so much cartridge space Sega had to play with, yet the effect is a world where you're the only active element. Nothing is time limited. The quest is still there if you decide to spend 20 hours knocking around the backwoods of the ice planet hunting for White and Blue Dragons - and by extension, experience points.
This is a theme that comes up time and again in our culture, in games and on television. The world is something that exists for you to assert yourself against it, whether as an individual battling against faceless, anonymous hordes or, in this case, a static world that changes in part only because of your actions. There is congruence here between Phantasy Star's world and the active consuming individual patronised and valorised by contemporary consumer cultures. You are flattered and seduced for the contents of your purse and wallet, feted as if the world revolves around you, that it exists for the sating of your desires - whatever they may be. Phantasy Star reflects the culture that spawned it, but also unconsciously embeds those logics into the structure of the game. When you assume the mantle of Alis and accept her quest to avenge her brother, you're playing her role. And on top of that, you're roleplaying a banal, oft-unremarked, but absolutely crucial constituent of neoliberal consumer culture.
