Men with longer ring fingers are more fertile, assertive and musical, for instance; and now research shows that women with longer ring fingers are better at sport.. Climate change was placed firmly on the agenda at the Labour Party Conference yesterday, when Bill Clinton highlighted it as one of three great challenges facing the modern world. And while he praised Tony Blair’s successes in pushing for co-ordinated global action to cut greenhouse gas emissions, and made much of the economic benefits of moving to a low-carbon economy, he left no doubt that more must be done, and quickly. Political leaders at all levels and of all colours now recognise the urgency and scale of the challenge posed by climate change They even do a good pitch on the need for action Sometimes, we even get a few policies.
The Conservatives recently called for new high-speed trains to replace short-haul flights Ming Campbell just put forward an ecological tax programme. Gordon Brown told us how he plans to publish a report on the environment and job creation All this is great, but emissions are still rising.. Bob Geldof has a lovely Irish way. His flowing answers, his copulatory catchphrase, his indescribable hair, they were all very welcome on Celebrity Day of the Labour conference. It’s so hard to keep the momentum going following the leader’s speech
When Geldof speaks, you do listen We didn’t learn much, but we did listen.
He said there are 100 doctors in Liberia, that the Congo is “without structure”, and that one cause of poverty in Africa is that 70 per cent of their intellectuals live abroad Perhaps we should send some of ours I’m sure we could spare David Aaronovitch He’d feed a family of six for months. I’m not sure these reflections are very worthy but no less unworthy than the cant our public figures give on Africa. “An African life is worth as much as a Western one”, Tony Blair said yesterday. We all know, deep in our secret heart, that it simply isn’t true. As they die in their millions they cause infinitely less anguish than the dozens who died in the London bombings.
Oh, and one reason Africa lacks doctors is that we steal them.
More from Simon Carr. Just as Tony Blair was telling us all in Manchester that the rise in Islamic terrorism had nothing to do the invasion of Iraq, Washington was publishing extracts from a National Intelligence Estimate that said the precise opposite. The assessment by the joint intelligence bodies of the US is clear and devastating in its conclusions. The number of activists it says, is increasing, fuelled in no small degree by Iraq, which had become “the cause c?bre for jihadists, breeding a deep resentment of US involvement in the Muslim world and cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement”.
Other causes were “fear of western domination, leading to anger humiliation, and a sense of powerlessness” and “pervasive anti-US sentiment among most Muslims – all of which jihadists exploit”.Over here, in our open society, we don’t publish intelligence estimates of course (and, it is true that President Bush declassified this report only after leaks to the newspapers, and then only in part). But for the US, you can now read the UK in this assessment, and for the American intelligence bodies you can, one suspects, assume a similar assessment over here.For Tony Blair to claim, as he did in his speech, the terrorist threat is “not a consequence of foreign policy” on the ground, that terror existed before 9/11 is denying reality to the point of criminal negligence.
The British public has just as much right to an accurate assessment of risk and cause as the American public. It should not be deprived of it simply because its Prime Minister wants to avoid shouldering responsibility.Still more disgraceful for a government that keeps claiming it wants to “listen” to public concerns was to hold an entire conference while forbidding debate on Afghanistan and to pretend that the sizable anti-war protests outside the conference hall weren’t happening.Hearing Mr Blair’s speech, one was struck first and foremost by the thought of what a wonderful peroration it would have been if Iraq had never happened. Then he could have gone on all he wanted about the wonders of domestic policy But Iraq did happen. It remains the single defining feature of Mr Blair’s premiership and the issue that most exercises the public.”The British,” he said, “will sometimes forgive a wrong decision. They won’t forgive not deciding.” That might or might not be true of the Dome but it doesn’t apply to a decision to go to war. Not the least reason for the real anger with Tony Blair among many Labour supporters as others is his constant refusal to accept just how serious the decision was.The reason why Bush finally decided to declassify bits of the National Intelligence Estimate, other than the fact he was forced to, is that it backs up his claim that the very fact Iraq is a magnet for terror makes it all the more important for the US and its allies to fight for final victory.The trouble with this argument is that it raises the question, if the US and British presence is making Iraq into a cause c?bre for the jihadists, then surely our continuation there is making it worse.
