Chanster

Only in America with its inherent contradictions and flaws could a black President have been elected. The belief in the American Dream lives on and America is still truly the land of opportunity. A female President is merely a question of timing.

There are three things to consider with Obama's victory:-

1. He is NOT the Messiah and problems will not simply disappear with his election. He is hamstrung by the enormous cost of the 'War on Terror' and unless he can find a way to end these wars, his domestic policies will be limited by finance. To compensate, Obama will need the 21st century equivalent of Roosevelt's 'Brain's Trust' - a body of the good and the great in America that can provide innovative but largely cheap solutions to America's economic woes.

2. Race politics is dead! Obama could not have achieved his victory without the vote of white Americans and they have bought into his message of consensual politics. Black Americans can no longer afford to be bitter or divided over issues of race, particularly over the issue of slavery. Obama's Presidential victory has 'wiped the slate clean' and Obama himself has railed against the excuses used by black Americans to explain away poverty and under-achievement. Anybody who thinks this is naive is a Jacksonnite of the worst kind and does not truly understand Obama's stance on race relations. Now is the time to hold out an olive brance and build a broad church of consensual politics irrespective of race, religion or background. Juts think about this; 30 years ago America was segregated along racial lines. Now a black president has been ellected. Martin Luther King Jr will be smiling in his grave!

3. Obama is NOT a Communist! He and the Democratic Party are centre right in a way that people outside America do not truly understand. Obama is a conservative with a small c and will focus on domestic and foreign policies that will benefit America.

Remember 1992?!? Labour was forecast to sweep to victory in the weeks running up to the General Election. I remember it well. I wore my best suit on the day of voting, replete with a red rose in the top pocket. It was a bright and sunny morning, which I likened to the gods favouring the Labour Party. How wrong we were!!! I could not get out of bed over the week-end such was the state of shock I was in. How did Labour lose? All the pollsters got it wrong and in the final analysis, what happened? Simply this - people said one thing and did another. It could happen all over again come Election Day in November in the U S of A! Why? Because race matters and it is such a taboo subject for ordinary (middle and working class) Americans that they will simply say one thing to the pollsters, but may do something else in the confines of that tiny booth when only they and their conscience/God will determine how the good people of America vote. Here are three personal anecdotes to illustrate the extent to which race matters in the USA:-

1. I was at my best friend's wedding in Baltimore in April. He lives in an increasingly gentrified area called Locust Point adjoining another leafy suburb called Federal Hill near the Inner Harbour. I was astonished to discover that 65% of the population of Baltimore is black. Astonished because I rarely saw a black face in these areas during my time in the city. Unofficial racial segregation it appears is alive and well in modern day America. How can mutual understanding be fostered and developed if black and white Americans separate themselves physically and geographically in this fashion???

2. I was at the Gettysburg Museum in Pennsylvannia when my friends noticed that I was being gawked and pointed at by a bunch of American high school kids. It was as if they had never seen a Chinaman before. I do not know even where to begin to try and explain away the depths of this ignorance in modern day America, particularly when America is founded upon a nation of immigrants. Don't believe me? Study the surnames in any US telephone directory.

3. My friend, a banker in the City of London, was shopping in Macys, NYC when he noticed that he was being followed by the plain clothes store detective. Was the fact that he is black have anything to do with it or just plain old coincidence???

Can Barack Obama pull out the greatest illusion of all time by making all Americans colour blind?!? I believe he can with the force of his personality and the veracity of his policies. Look at the Latin words on the Great Seal - it says 'e pluribus unum' (from the many one). This is the trick that he has to pull off - by uniting all Americans together irrespective of race, creed, religion or colour.

Never underestimate Bill Clinton. The big dog did it again with his rousing support of Barack Obama and his denunciation of Republican policies. His oratory was a firm reminder that he was one of America's most intelligent and articulate Presidents. He summarised America's problems very neatly by pointing to economic recession at home and failed leadership abroad. There was also a memorable line which summed up US foreign policy quite succinctly when Clinton said that people around the world were more impressed by 'the power of the examples that America makes, rather than the examples of American power'. Take heed and I say again, unless the Republicans deviate from a militaristic foreign policy, America will survive long eneough to see itself become the villain and this process is happening now!

Bill doesn't deserve her! How could he have cheated on someone who is so intelligent, passionate and composed? If only we had a female politician with half of her ability in this country!?! Forget the critics. Obama needed Hillary to deliver a ringing endorsement of his Presidential nomination and she delivered it in spades. The speech was a barnstorming, thunderous delivery of her support for him and should, should if her supporters are genuine Democrats, deliver her votes to him. It was a far ranging speech and touched all the bases of women's rights to gay rights, the American economy to the war in Iraq and her husband's time as President to a gracious recognition of team Obama - his wife, Michelle and the VP nominee and his wife. Consider the context - Hillary was trying to build the family's political dynasty with her Presidential nomination. She also deeply appreciated the historical significance of what she was trying to do - breaking the glass ceiling of opportunities for women in America and women everywhere. Imagine the feeling of desolation and disappointment that she must have felt when the prize slipped from her grasp, particularly when nine months ago, she was a dead cert for the nomination. So near, yet so far!!! In this context, Hillary's speech was more supportive than Obama could have expected. It also confirmed Hillary as the most important female politican in America and perhaps in the world. If not the king, she has become the kingmaker - perhaps an even more influential political role.

And now its over to her husband to give a ringing endorsement of Obama's nomination and over to Obama himself. He needs to do three things if he is to garner widespread national support:-

1. Less rhetoric and ephemeral calls for change. Be specific! Obama needs to give brief but concrete examples of his policies on the American economy and the ending of the war in Iraq.

2. To do so, he needs to appoint a well respected military man such as Wesley Clark to be his Secretary of War.

3. He needs to expound upon a BIG idea, i.e. his plans to provide universal healthcare free at the point of delivery for the poor and dispossessed.

Suffice to say, Obama will be giving the most important speech of his life and if it goes well and he does indeed become the President of the United States, it should be heralded as one of the greatest political speeches of the 20th century because he has to do two things: transcend his colour in a nation that is still deeply divided over colour and to offer renewed hope for millions of Americans. He will need to take inspiration from Roosevelt and JFK. If he fails, history will not be kind to him and it will be another generation (or two) when another serious candidate of colour will emerge to contest the nost powerful position on earth (that is until China takes over in about 100 years!).

There will be tears of relief, joy and frustration today as thousands of students receive their A-Level results and once again, the good, the great and the plain stupid will make pompous announcements praising and justifying government education policy or decrying the achievements of our youngsters. What is the truth. Ah the truth, that elusive creature. What is the first casualty in war?

Good news! I'm here to give you the last word on the matter and the truth of this can be corroborated by any decent and honest teacher willing to tell the truth, so here it is... the truth about 'dumbing down':

First,over the last 20 years the quality of teaching has improved dramatically. Two things have occurred to make it so. The introduction of the National Curriculum imposed national teaching standards in England and Wales. As a result of this, bad teachers were weeded out of the profession and new teachers had to be more reflective and evaluative about what they were doing. The National Curriculum may have been derided by some as being too prescriptive, BUT it did impose a form of quality control that was badly needed.

Here's my first anecdote about bad teaching in the 1980s and no doubt everbody has a memory of a truly awful teacher who should have been locked up for ruining the life chances of their precious charges. I had an economics teacher whose claim to fame was being a squash champion in the 1930s and being taught at Oxford University. His idea of an A-Level economics lesson was to arrive to class with a copy of the Times newspaper, which he then proceeded to read extracts from, presumably as a way of generating some sort of class debate/intellectual discussion. Unfortunately, to this day, I cannot work out where the link to A-Level Economics was!?! This occurred without rhyme or reason every lesson for two years. Guess what? We all failed the exam miserably. One of my friends who was arguably the brightest boy in the school took the resit under his own steam (completely self taught) and passed it at Xmas with a 'B' grade!!!

Second, teaching and passing exams is and should not be mutually exclusive. The point of exams is to provide students with some semblance of life skills - the ability to read, write and add up - and hopefully, the skill of being able to think critically and God forbid, generating an enthusiasm for lifelong learning. Here's my point - teachers today have become incredibly skilful at teaching their students to pass exams, hence the impressive pass rates. Are they bad teachers? No! Why? Because teachers can only work within the current examination system. Don't blame them for mastering the system. Rather, look at the system itself. However, bear this in mind. All formal written examinations have a structural weakness - they can be deconstructed and the skills required for high marks taught/coached/passed onto students in rote fashion.

Let me give you an example. Any examination requiring an essay can be mastered by the student by simply memorising a series of model essays based upon the syllabus content. The student doesn't even have to have written the essays themselves! Of course, the student will need to have a good memory and be astute enough to change the content and the structure of the essay to match the examination question, but even then the question is always a variant on the same theme. Even so called 'thick kids' can 'master' the teachnique of passing exams well if they are prepared to put in long hours of rote learning to make up for their intellectual deficiencies. Anyone who tells you otherwise is either plain stupid or self deluded and I am still astonished at the denials and the lengths examination boards will go to deny this simple fact.

Third, bright students today are no different from bright students 10, 50, 100 or even 2000 years ago. You cannot change something as fundamental as intelligence through diet or environmental factors in such a short space of time. So why are students today apparently doing better than their peers of yesteryear? The answer is simple. Exams today are being marked in an easier way!!! Let me give you some anecdotal evidence with A-Level History. A few years ago, four questions were set in the document paper. Each question was created to assess a particular skill; for example, two questions were set to test the students' understanding of reliability and utility. Unfortunately, students performed poorly at these questions and results were falling. What did the Board do? They dropped the questions and amalgamated the skills in the remaining sub questions.

You tell me, is this an example of dumbing down or not?!? BUT, here's the rub. Bright students today will have done just as well in any other generation irrespective of the examination in front of them. That is why they are bright and largely independent workers. The truth of the matter is that very intelligent students teach themselves. The difference between today's results and yesteryear's results lie in the performance of the middle and the tail, especially the tail. Those students at the lower end of the intellectual spectrum who are passing Maths, English, Science and a whole plethora of subjects with grade C or higher today would have simply failed the equivalent O-Levels of yesteryear and that is a fact!!!

Put simply, failure has become a hot political football and is simply not an option for governments of any hue. Prince Charles may have put in bluntly but he was essentially right when he said that 'there cannot be prizes for all' and at the moment this is precisely the culture that we are in; a 'prizes for all' culture that rewards failure because we are too politically correct to say to people that they have failed. Many students are simply not academic and will fail academic exams. What we have to do as a nation is to redirect their talents and skills in other worthwhile areas where they can genuinely succeed.

To summarise the truth about examination results and dumbing down:-

1. Teachers are more skilful today at teaching students to pass exams. However, passing exams should not be mutually exclusive to learning.

2. The top tier of students will always achieve in any era and it is unfair to label them as failures in an examination system that is disingenuous at best and defunct at worst.

3. Marking at the examination boards have become easier/weaker (just ask any teacher that mark exams in the summer). The result of this is to raise the attainment of the middle and especially the lower end. This explains why students are seemingly doing better. The truth is they're not at the lower end. The way in which marks are rewarded for student's knowledge has become easier.

So if you get confused at what people are telling you about A-Levels, GCSEs or/and the current debate about the education system, for the LAST WORD, read this blog. It's the truth!!!

WOW! We came, we saw, we were conquered. Short of a real life dragon breathing on the Olympic torch, the lighting of the Olympic flame and the opening ceremony could not have been more spectacular and indeed, the best show put on in Olympic history (you believe a man can fly!). This was more than a show, its symbolism writ large for the world to see - China had arrived on the world stage, the Dragon had truly awoken! The artistic genius behind the ceremony, Zhang Yimou, displayed two faces of China to the world. The first was its ancient and cultural heritage in art, poetry and theatre embellished upon a giantic moving scroll. The second was a modern China steeped in technological advancement and innovation (just how did they lift the Olympic rings off the floor?). The Chinese have honoured their commitment to the world to put on a spectacular Games and boy, did they do it justice on Day 1. What this shows more than anything else is that China can no longer be viewed as a 'developing nation' or a country in the 'Third World'. This was the day China celebrated its coming of age, its debutante, its graduation day. What this also means for China is that it must take a leadership role in world affairs, the war on terror, the ecological and economic problems afflicting the world. It must not sit idly by but must take a more proactive role in creating a more harmonious, peaceful and prosperous world. With great power comes great responsibility and if China can construct a skilful foreign policy, it will change the way the world sees communism and the one party state that is China. Benovlent dictatorship IS a viable and alternative system of rule and can work if it is truly focused upon the good of the Chinese people. There has never been an economic model as the one that exists in China today, one which Deng Xiaoping described as 'communism with two faces'. It has worked so far by lifting the vast majority of Chinese out of abject poverty. There will be interesting days ahead as China seeks to jostle for its rightful position on the world stage with the USA and Europe.

China has spent $40 billion dollars on the Games in an effort to make it one of the most exciting spectacles ever, yet, all the Western media keep harping on about is the (perceived) lack of democracy and human rights in China. This portrays an utter lack of understanding about the history, social structures, mental attitudes and belief systems of the Chinese people and the country itself. These simplistic sound bites are simply IGNORANCE WRIT LARGE! The Western democratic model of government based upon the idea of liberty and freedom of speech (which is so important to our American cousins) may have served the West well over the years (absolutist states in Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries not withstanding!), but it is wholly inappropriate and inadequate in different parts of the world that have developed in very different ways, i.e. the Middle East and Far East. Until the Americans and Western European states understand this, US foreign policy will remain disastrous and to use a quote from a recent hit film, America will survive long enough to see itself cast as the villain (tragically with Britain in tow). What a turn around from a people who liberated Europe in 1944 in the memory of Lafayette!

Just think about a couple of examples in history where democracy was supposed to be a panacea for a brighter and happier future. First, Iraq; prior to British control of the country in 1922 as a League of Nations mandate, the diverse peoples in that country had been living harmoniously together side by side for centuries under Ottoman rule. Why? Because the Sultans had used their commonsense to divide the territory along ethnic and hence religious lines to minimise racial conflict. After 1922, these territories disappeared as British planners threw these different peoples together by stupidly and clumsily drawing nice straight lines across the country to act as land borders. It would take a strongman at the centre 30 years later to restore order. Forty years after that, the same man would be illegally removed from power and the result...? Irag is now in complete anarchy and together with Afghanistan has the potential to destabilise the whole of the Middle East, as well as British and American coffers. And the response from the West to this carnage? Let's bomb Iraq because there is no democracy in that country and consequently is a dangerous and subversive threat to the West, despite the complete lack of any evidence. Duh...how?!? The average man and woman on the streets of Tehran I am sure is happy with their lot in life and certainly do not want to be invaded by a foreign power just because they have the temerity to suggest that democracy is not the wonderful creation that we in the West think it is!!!

If democracy is so great, why has Blair and this Labour government and all the other political parties who agreed with it, got away with starting a war on our behalf with a lie about WMDs?!? Half a million people on a sunny day in February said there were no WMDS and consequently there should be no war. These people have been proved right. Where then is the proper response from those people that lied to us or made such a catstrophic mistake that has cost the lives of so many brave men and women, both militarily and civilian? So much for democracy then!

Here is another example of democracy doing well in another country - in the old Soviet Union. In 1985, Reagan and the West promised all sorts of financial help to the communists once democracy had been established in the 'evil empire'. The rest, as they say, is history but... has democracy served the Russian people well over the last 15 years? What you have is Putin hanging onto power by attempting to change the Russian constitution to become Prime Minister and appointing a puppet as President. Corruption is unabated and exists on a grand scale with the mafia controlling large parts of the economy. State industries and resources that rightfully belonged to the people were illegally sold off on the cheap by Yeltsin (with what backhanders the mind boggles) and now, these Russian oligarchs are laundering their money by buying up huge swathes of Chelsea. And what about the poor Russian people who sacrificed 20 million of their brothers and sisters to win the Second World War? Did they get a better deal out of democracy??? Are their standards of living any better now than under the communists? And what about law and order in Russia? More secure now with Boris, Oleg and Yuri running about making money any which way they can?

And now to China. Concepts cannot be thought of and applied in absolute terms, so when Amnesty International tells us that executions for petty crimes are on the increase in China, their idea of 'human rights' must be contextualised. Nobody can even begin to understand China without first going there. The first thing that you notice is the people and the sheer weight of humanity. It is then that a number, 1.3 billion, has corporeal form, it is no longer just a number. In China you can see what this really means and what this means is that there are far too many people in China and life becomes cheap, even worthless. Mao once said that it was OK if 1 million died in a war because he had another 10 million to count upon. Think about it. There is a cold logic to this which is correct, no matter how uncomfortable this may sit with Western libertarian notions of 'human rights' and democracy. There is another problem with this mass of humanity and that is one of control. How on earth do you keep law and order when the potential for chaos is so great with the sheer weight of humanity confined in such a small space? Think about the logistics of locking up millions of criminals and the financial implications of this. Is it practical or even do able? Added to that must be the Chinese reverance for Confucian ideas about hieracrchy and family and social structure. Put simply, the state reflects a filial nuclear structure where the government is the patriarch that oversees and governs people in society, albeit in a dictatorial way at times and for centuries this has been the case in China. You are not going to overturn these precepts overnight, if they can be overturned at all with Western pressure and talk about human rights and democracy.

So, here's my point, in a British education system with the aim of turning people into independent, critical thinkers, for God sake, THINK about the issues properly. Don't be swayed by simplistic and stupid soundbites from the media that criticise China for its lack of human rights and freedom of speech. Instead, CONTEXTUALISE what this actually means for China and the Chinese people and instead, think about the positive things that the Chinese (Communist) government have done to improve the lives of Chinese poeple, for example, lifting 400 million people out of poverty over the laste 20 years!!! A feat unmatched anywhere in the world. China is and never will be a simulation of Western democratic ideals and beliefs because of its very different history and development. Like shopping malls, do we all want to be the same? Is this globalising world increasingly becoming more homgenised? Democracy is not appropriate, practical or even welcomed by ordinary people in certain parts of the world. Instead, why don't we look at the failures of democracy to see if we can learn from other systems and models of governance that have served their countries so well and adapt them in the West?

If you happen to be in Beijing, go to the Grand Hyatt Hotel near Tiannemann Square and stand outside the main entrance on the top step. As you take in the view of the fountain in front of you lit up with bright lights in the evening, take a look up at the Chinese flag fluttering gently in the warm evening breeze and say to yourself, 'so this is Communism...'!!!