Margaret Thatcher had some kind of a faith… [Margaret Thatcher avea un soi de credinţă…]

Floods of bytes and pixels are being dedicated these moments to the death of Margaret Thatcher, undoubtedly an outstanding personality of the past century.

It would be a futile attempt from my part to write an obituary, as long as countless other political analysts and historians (as a lousy blogger, I can’t pretend to be any of these) have already published good articles about the Iron Lady who helped tear down the Iron Curtain, bring the USSR on its knees, and end the Cold War.

What I would like to do is draw attention to some of her religious beliefs. Although by no means in accordance with the Orthodox Church’s doctrine, her ideas were quite unparalleled in our secular EU and in stark contrast with the concoction of politically correct clichés that current leaders hold as paramount beliefs.

She probably was the last (or among the last) genuine political personalities of human history, which seems to have entered a decrepit phase of copycat leaders, of pathetic strawmen like Tony Bliar, Gordon Clown, David Chameleon, Barack Obama, Traian Băsescu or... Victor Ponta.

Brainwashed by nihilistic ideologies, trailing their twisted moral backbones and crippled ambitions on the world scene, these statesmen (and women – let’s not forget feminine versions, like Angela Merkel or Hillary Clinton, of the above antiheroes!) are but ethically eviscerated puppets.

Like all great historical heroes (including her favourite Winston Churchill) Margaret Thatcher remains a controversial character. However, unlike most leaders of our troubled times, she had some form of faith.

A faith as staunchly followed as probably only great characters of yore did, perhaps Oliver Cromwell or John Knox. Here are some of her beliefs about Christianity (taken from here): 

“Methodism isn’t just a religion for Sundays – no faith is only a faith for Sundays. There were a lot of things during the week which one attended. Methodism is a pretty practical faith; there were the mothers’ sewing meetings and the guilds for young people.”

“If you are faced with the real problems of poverty and ignorance and people don’t know how best to grow crops, you’ve got a pretty simple, straightforward task because you’ve got to help, and help in practical terms. 

Because while you’re teaching them religion you’ve got to recognise that they are not very likely to receive it or understand it unless it does mean something and enables them to do things for themselves.

“So you replace poverty by a better standard of living out of people’s own efforts, because everyone’s got talent and ability, and you teach them what we regard as necessary to life, and you teach them religion as well.” 

“So when you’ve relieved poverty and ignorance and disease, if you are not a Christian you think that sorts out the problems of the world. You and I know it doesn’t, because there is still the real religious problem in the choice between good and evil. Choice is the essence of ethics.

If you deny that personal responsibility you are denying the religious basis of life – that’s the difference between me and a Marxist. The values by which you and I live are not values given by the State.” 

“Christianity is about more than doing good works. It is a deep faith which expresses itself in your relationship to God. It is a sanctity, and no politician is entitled to take that away from you or to have what I call corporate State activities which only look at interests as a whole.

So, you’ve got this double thing which you must aim for in religion, to work to really know your faith and to work it out in everyday life. You can’t separate one from the other. 

Good works are not enough because it would be like trying to cut a flower from its root; the flower would soon die because there would be nothing to revive it.” 

[For all the posts on this blog go to/Pentru toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la: Contents/Cuprins]

The crippled giant [Gigantul infirm]

One shouldn’t have necessarily been a great military analyst to anticipate that such a moment would sooner (rather than later) come for the Perfidious Albion.

The commanders of the armed forces (depleted by budgetary cuts) seem to be shrugging their shoulders in front of David Cameron’s request to implement a no-fly zone over Syria.

Great Britain, the former superpower of the 19th and early 20th century, can’t do anything in Syria by itself, and mustering American and NATO support would take much time.

The only readily available ally would be Turkey, but imposing a Libyan scenario on Bashar al-Assad can certainly draw the ire of Russia.

Would Britain (and France?!) risk another Crimean War, when the odds of victory are so different from what they were some 160 years ago?

Assuming that the newly re-elected ‘pacifist’ at the White House agrees with Cameron’s eagerness to go to war, wouldn’t all risk turning into a Third World War?

If I were Argentina’s president these days, I’d be rubbing my hands, wishing very much to see Britain involved in Syria.

The military giant of 1982 is severely crippled, while Obama will most probably not do anything to defend the pride of the USA’s former colonial power.

By the time (2016-2018) London gets a new aircraft carrier, it would be very unlikely for the next (Labour?!) government to promise retaking the Falkland Islands.

[For all the posts on this blog go to/Pentru toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la: Contents/Cuprins]

Hollow triumphalism [Triumfalism găunos]

In the wake of the last EU summit, all leaders who had entered lengthy negociations in Brussels claimed ‘victory’, whilst not truly achieving anything substantial for the half a billion European citizens.

On the one hand, the presumed Franco-German diktat of a European Fiscal Union stepped closer to reality than ever before.

By March 2012, another EU Treaty with as strong historical implications as those of the Treaty of Maastricht is due to be signed.

Out of the EU’s current 27 members (soon to be 28), at least 23 countries will no longer decide exclusively by themselves how to shape their national budgets. A Big – and pressumably wiser – Brother in Brussels (the European Commission) would ‘help’ national governments plan their spending more carefully.

That should be cheered as a ‘triumph’ of common sense and seen as a ‘safeguard’ that public debt would stop accumulating to unsustainable levels in EU countries, we were told.

Nevertheless, this assumption regarding the smooth functioning of the future United States of Europe (USE) does absolutely nothing to solve the actual economic crisis in Europe, and the future of the common currency is still uncertain.

Irrespective of the ideological debate – is it worth giving up national sovereignty or not, could Europeans live better within the USE than in their national states? – a full fiscal union offers no solutions to the current debt crisis…

Neither to the lack of competitivity of many European economic sectors or to the demographic and moral decline of the Old Continent.

When and who is ever going to address those issues in the EU? For how long would political leaders be fooled by fictions such as ‘economic growth’ and ‘prosperity’, which are impossible to achieve while built up on other fictions such as ‘credit’ and ‘capital markets’?

When will history makers (politicians) learn the bitter lessons of history that all times of severe crisis are the broader consequence of a grave moral ills rather than effects of mere disfunctionalities or redeemable mistakes?

There cannot be growth on a continent where millions of EU nationals are are still ‘second (or even fourth!) class citizens’ on the job market, where the brain drain to the USA has never ceased, where hedonism, promiscuity, moral relativism and abortions are widespread.

On the other hand, Britain’s PM David Cameron also claimed his petty ‘victory’ for managing to snatch his country out of the future new European treaty.

Far be it from me to join those deploring Great Britain’s self-condemnation to many years (the most commmonly invoked figure is 20) of isolation. After all, outside the European Exchange Mechanism and the Eurozone, Britain had done better than it would have probably done inside.

Anyway, the much esteemed financial services and the partly nationalised British banking system will not remain immune to what’s going on in the Eurozone, and their freedom of maneuver could be limited whether the UK is in or out a new EU treaty.

Cameron put himself in a ridiculous position, as defender of the bankers (and not for the first time!) in an era when everyone hates them, although most EU Council solutions to the crisis favoured this clique, not the European taxpayers.

In spite of being portrayed as an isolationist (in Europe) or foolish (at home), he dared taking a huge gamble, and that’s somewhat admirable.

Especially when compared to yesmen like Romania’s President Traian Băsescu, who has been a brainwashed lobbyist for the USE even long before this last EU summit.

Last, the little victories of the Hungarian, Swedish and Czech delegations who said they would first consult national parliaments are also ridiculous. It’s not impossible but very unlikely that they would join Britain on the isolationist path.

Britain and Sweden could possibly afford it, like Switzerland and Norway. But Hungary and the Czech Republic would eventually give in to unbearable pressures.

All the triumphalism of those pretending to avoid a catastrophy either by wowing for deeper European integration or, on the contrary, by staying out of too much integration – is equally meaningless.

Europe is in desperate need of both sound economic solutions and of reshaped moral foundations, which it gravely lacks.

Their absence is by no means a sign that the Old Continent requires a ‘revolution’ in political terms or a sort of ‘Nuremberg trial’ for a failed generation of bankers and/or politicians.

It would actually need other Europeans – people aspiring towards what truly matters in this life (which is but an antechamber of afterlife), not hordes of hedonist copycats, enslaved by the dreadful illusion that happiness equals a perpetual ‘I-do-what-I-please (having fun, feeling good) here and now’...

Simply replacing a wrong ideological model (unrestricted free flow of capital, living on credit) with another (a centralisation of austerity) leaves little room for hope. Everything will keep turning from bad to worse.

[For all the posts on this blog go to/Pentru toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la: Contents/Cuprins]

God’s place in a humanist society (18) [Locul lui Dumnezeu într-o societate umanistă]

So that the previous episode of this series didn’t seem too biased against Britain’s leaders, I should balance it with a similar inquisitorial tone regarding the equally chameleonic leaders of Romania, and the ‘Christian’ (?!) nation they rule over.

Actually, there’s more honesty in the UK. Leaders, as well as ordinary citizens, may have a perverted acception of Christianity or a clearly atheist outlook on life, however, they are (more or less) openly professing their beliefs.

On the other hand, while ruling over a nation of predominantly Orthodox Christians, Romanian political leaders often find themselves more compelled to become ‘tightrope walkers’ in regards to expressing religious opinion in public.

Almost none would declare themselves nonbelievers, like Nick Clegg, nor would their popularity profit from the sort of ‘political correct Christianity’ shamelessly paraded by Tony Bliar or a bit more decently exibited by David Chameleon.

Anyway, disguising their utter indifference to religion is the least of the ‘crimes’ that Romanian leaders could be guilty of.

Even to a greater extent than politicians in Britain – where there is still a class system in place, denying the acces of ordinary mortals to upper steps on the social ladder – Romanian leaders are the mirror image of Romanians.

Irrespective of the centuries old tradition of regarding the rulers of this land as ‘corrupt’ villains who were (and still are) oppressing a ‘virtuos’ nation, it’s simplistic to judge history in these terms.

It’s very likely that most of the 86.7% self-confessed Orthodox Christians in Romania (making up the second most populous Orhodox Church after that of Russia) resemble more the leaders they despise than the Saints whom they are supposed to immitate.

Self-centered (albeit not spared of a great deal of self-loathing), hedonist, vain, envious, lazy, inconsistent, gossipy, unreliable, complaintful, cowardly – this is how many Romanians (including Orthodox believers, including myself!) are.

Above all these, the greatest sin is our hypocrisy – seeing faults only in political leaders and Church hierarchs, yet almost never within ourselves.

There’s a proverb saying that “the fish rots from the head down,” and countless historical examples seem to support this claim. In spite of this, when it comes to disasters that befall entire nations, it would be reckless to believe that the Lord may be arbitrarily punishing ‘virtuos nations’ with undeserved unworthy leaders. 

An often motivated presumption of guilt has been cast upon all political leaders in Romania, and a definitely unmotivated presumption of innocence was bestowed on the ‘ordinary’ citizens.

Herod was no better than most of the Jewish society at the time when the Son of God was born into this world. Nor were most Jews under Ahab and Jezebel, in Elijah’s days.

To the same degree, most Britons may not be better than the successive ‘chamelelons’ in Downing Street 10, while Romanians surely deserve a mischeivous character like president Traian Băsescu is.

A country soaking with the blood of some 20 million aborted children for the past 20 years, cannot expect anything else then a ‘reckoning day’ that will surely come.  

Any nation  wearing this ‘mark of Cain’ (and so is the case with Russia, UK, France or China) has no moral right whatsoever to hope that a ‘providential leader’ could bring ‘providential solutions’; on the contrary, things will keep turning from bad to worse.

The shameless and self-interested daily deeds of political leaders that outrage us, the ‘law abiding citizens’ and ‘good Christians’, only happen to be in the spotlight (thus more visible), yet they are not worse than our personal sins.

Be it true that the sins of rulers in power have farther reaching consequences than the personal sins of each of us, it is the sum of the latter that has thrown Romania (Britain or any other nation for that matter) into the present spiritual abyss.

[For all the episodes of this series, and all the posts on this blog go to/Pentru toate episoadele din această serie şi toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la: Contents/Cuprins]

The world is ablaze [Lumea este în flăcări]

Ever since the Wall Street Crisis of September 2008, the word as we knew it up until the mid 2000s turned into an erratic stage on which actors appear to have been messing up the play script.

To some of us, all (or most) elected leaders, autocrats, nations, multinational companies, ‘heroes’ and ‘villains’ alike appear to follow no indication of a director. Their actions seldom make any sense. They seem to act chaotically.

To others, all these characters are actually following scrupulously some precise guidelines, according to what are naively dimissed as ‘conspiracy theories’.

We don’t know who wrote the script, neither can we indentify the director, yet we surely are crazy about this global reality show. And who are we, after all?

Let’s assume that we are the 1,966,514,816 internet users in the world, that is some 28,7% of all people alive today. We’re being served ‘news’ as cattle are fed feed on grass and on other dubious fodder that makes our food so unhealthy.

Of a truth, ‘news’ isn’t as it used to be anymore. Novelties don’t travel across the world in sailing ships, but with the speed of megabytes per second.

Gun barrels are still smoking and bullet wounds still bleeding in Libya (or anywhere else for that matter), yet we have already chewed and spit some ‘news’.

The world is ablaze, and here we are, mesmerised by the flames, enjoying the show. Whether it lasts or not makes no difference to us, as more and more episodes have been stockpilling in our civilisation’s (the one that gave us the internet!) backyard.

We, the ‘civilised ones’, have sown so many toxic seeds, all over the world, throughout the past 200-300 years, that we could reap disasters for centuries to come.

For instance, the USA, the Perfidious Albion & Italy are much guiltier (as accomplices) for the horrors we witness in Libya today than Saddam Hussein was guilty in 2003, when a ‘coalition of the willing’ struck him down.

The self-proclaimed ‘King of Kings’ ruling Libya for 41 years was a despicable ‘dictator’ decades ago, yesterday’s eccentric ‘jester’ – received with great honours everywhere, and a friend of ‘T. Bliar’ – whilst he is now an archenemy of civilisation.

And this time it seems to be for real. There’s no need of a PR campaign to describe him as a monster, no need to invent a ‘threat’ represented by his weapons of mass destruction. His utterly senseless murders did truly happen and keep happening.

Nevertheless, I wonder: who would dare a military intervention, ousting him from the last bunkers and patches of desert where he is still clinging on to power? Is there in preparation any ‘coalition of the willing’ ready to intervene?

Will Barack Obama – a loather of George W. Bush’s ‘war of choice’ in Iraq – choose to fight a war for the sake of all the values himself and America stand for?

Would David Cameron use his overstretched and underfinanced British armed forces in Libya as Winston Churchill did in the early 1940s? Could ‘T. Bliar’ exert some influence on his gone-mad friend, in order to stop the bloodshed?

If not in the name of values, will Obama and Cameron do it for the sake of oil or for saving America’s and Britain’s EU allies from the catastrophic perspective of having a new Somalia right across the Mediterranean Sea?

[For all the posts on this blog go to/Pentru toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la: Contents/Cuprins]

About public transport in the UK (17) [Despre transportul în comun în UK]

All companies everywhere in the world promise a lot of things (most of their offers being no more that ‘PR crap’), and so was doing this Brighton & Hove Bus and Coach Company, while I used their services almost daily.

I must say that they kept their word. I don’t know about other parts of the UK, nor whether the overall quality of service matches the subsidies (mainly for fuel) that British public transport firms are being given even after the economic crisis.

On the upper deck of its double decker buses one could read promises of “day trips” (for what they called “very reasonable prices”), of “no need to wait” (due to reliable departure times), and of “no such thing as last bus” (in the case of two lines at least).

But never count on witnessing these promised fulfilled when it snows! It’s not even necessary to have huge snowfalls and bitting frost, like in the past days, so that such a ‘good Brit example’ wouldn’t be available anymore.

The whole of Britain – including everyone form the Govermnent, to private firms, local councils, and probably most ordinary citizens – is gravely unprepared for tough winters, as even the current PM, David Cameron, proves it.

Partly, it’s because of the milder climate. It would make sense to invest in snow ploughs or stocking up too much salt & grit. But it could also be that few other countries, apart from the UK have been so hysterical about global warming, not the ‘Big Freeze’ for the past years.

[For all the episodes of this series, and all the posts on this blog go to/Pentru toate episoadele din această serie şi toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la: Contents/Cuprins]

Studentul nostru, stăpânul nostru (11) [Our student, our master]

Când am început serialul de faţă, mă aflam sub influenţa foarte bunei impresii despre învăţământul superior britanic. Ulterior, cum şade bine oricărui blogger, am mai fost şi cârcotaş.

S-or mai fi nuanţat părerile iniţiale, dar buna impresie nu mi-a dispărut. Senzaţia mea limpede a fost că studentul (britanic sau străin) care învaţă în UK este stăpân, adică pus în centrul politicilor de educaţie.

Tânărul sau mai puţin tânărul care vrea să înveţe într-o universitate britanică nu este doar o rotiţă într-un sistem, o cantitate neglijabilă, nici o vacă de muls – de taxe de studii, bani de cărţi, taxe de restanţe, şpăgi etc.

Desigur, aş putea fi acuzat că, fiind Chevening Fellow nici nu puteam avea o altă părere decât una superlativă. Admit că în mod sigur am fost privilegiat şi ferit de orice dificultăţi cu care se confruntă studenţii.

Însă şi experienţa personală, şi părerile altora, şi statisticile veneau toate să confirme calitatea învăţământului universitar din UK. De până acum. Căci despre ce va fi după tăierile bugetare + creşterea taxelor încolo sunt mulţi care se îngrijorează.

Şi nu mă refer doar la cei care au ieşit la cafteală cu nu foarte eficienţii poliţişti britanici, care şi-or fi ieşit din mână în ultimii 20 de ani trecuţi de la mişcările sociale din vremea premierului Margaret Thatcher.

Anarhiştilor (să nu fi fost şi troţkiştii pe acolo?!) prea puţin le pasă de taxele de studii. Însă ei nu-şi puteau face reprezentaţia dacă nu ieşeau pe străzi zeci de mii de tineri cu adevărat îngrijoraţi că un an de studii îi va costa de trei ori mai mult.

Îngrijorarea lor s-a auzit (din păcate, fără urmări) şi în Camera Lorzilor. Oricât de hulit ar fi acest corp legislativ neales, tocmai faptul că nu depinde de isteriile electorale, îl face o adevărată voce a raţiunii în Marea Britanie.

Majoritatea (273) ‘nobililor lorzi’ au votat în favoarea dureroaselor măsuri, dar din rândul celor (200) care s-au opus legii s-au ridicat întrebări care, mai mult ca sigur, îi frământă şi pe David Cameron şi Nick Clegg.

Nu cumva creşterea taxelor va duce la o creştere cu 300% a datoriilor studenţilor (student debt)? Oare nu se putea tăia bugetul mai prudent, mai chibzuit? Vor mai putea vreodată cei mai săraci dintre britanici să spere la studii universitare?

N-aş crede că Guvernul de coaliţie nu a cântărit bine chestiunile acestea. Dar, foarte probabil, nu mai este astă soluţie. Datoria publică a UK este sufocantă. Altfel cum ar fi fost Nick Clegg de acord cu o propunere sinucigaşă pentru partidul său?!

Pe de altă parte, mă întreb cum de îşi închipuie cineva că foştii studenţi îşi vor putea plăti vreodată datoriile? Şi ce va fi cu cei 60-70% dintre studenţii, veniţi din state UE, care studiază în UK graţie unui student loan, apoi nu mai rambursează nimic?

[Pentru toate episoadele din această serie şi toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la/For all the episodes of this series, and all the posts on this blog go to: Contents/Cuprins]

A military power of ‘first rank’ decimated by budgetary cuts [O putere militară de ‘prim rang’ decimată de tăieri bugetare]

A century of ‘Pax Britannica’ (1815-1914) couldn’t have been possible without the UK having one of the best armies and certainly the best Navy at that time. No temporary set-backs (during the Boer Wars for instance) could challenge the superiority of the Brits.

For better and for worse, Britain has shaped the 19th century world, and the world today is greatly influenced by a tremendous British heritage – the most obvious part of it being this global lingua franca, the English language.

.

Probably 10 or even 20 times more people than the entire population of Britain make up the number of pupils and students who study English everyday or at least once a week; that’s a huge number and probably unrivalled in history.

No matter how weird this explanation may seem to many contemporaries, I don’t think the spread of English could have been possible without the spilled blood of British military personnel all over the world.

Explaining it all through the ‘American cultural imperialism’ is simplistic. What’s happening nowadays is only a phase of a process that began centuries ago, as British ships sailed all seas, and British soldiers marched to the remotest corners of the planet.

Millions of Britons (including civilians in WWII) endured hardship and faced death, yet what the puppeters of the Perdidious Albion built upon that great sacrifice was often different from one those who perished had dreamed of.

It is the blood of many Britons what drew the borders of the world we live in, and the UK played an important role in the birth of many countries which are now part of the United Nations.

Some are former colonies: worldwide economic powers (USA, Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore), regional powers (South Africa), emerging powers (India) or more or less ‘exotic’ destinations (New Zealand, Belize).

A lot of other former British teritories arised to statehood (albeit often an instable or controversial one), from Cyprus, Israel, Iraq or Pakistan, to a myriad of Arab, African, Asian, and Pacific countries.

Finally, there are states whose emergence was a product of British diplomatic efforts or has a lot to do with British interference, like Belgium. There’s hardly any hot spot in the world today with no British footprint.

The often rutheless diplomatic games of those who pulled the strings could not have been possible in the absence of military might. Although gradually vanishing throughout the 20th century, UK’s armed forces still remained significantly strong.

Even for the past decade, when British soldiers were seen by some as poodels cavorting around the American ‘pure breed’ dogs of war, I still think it is unfair to look down upon these professional soldiers in such a manner.

If T. Bliar and G. Glown where, indeed, lousy characters who gambled on the lives of British soldiers, this doesn’t mean that those who died in Iraq and Afghanistan didn’t give their best on the battlefield, not that their commanders were incompetent.

Now David Cameron – who declares himself staunchly pro-America – severely cut the budget of the British armed forces. From an economical perspective, there are few doubts that such a heavily indebted country like the UK could have done otherwise.

However, long before the current economic crisis, the British armed forces were underfunded and many of those who lost their lives in Afghanistan died needlessly – very often due to lack of properly armoured vehicles and a shortage of helicopters.

As long as Cameron and Clegg seem to agree on cutting public expenses from all spheres of government activity, the armed forces will not be spared. And I bet there are enough Communists and pacifists in Britain who would have liked even deeper cuts.

All in all, the three branches (Army, Royal Navy, Royal Air Force) are due to lose a combined total 17,000 people, minus 25% of the civilians working for the Ministry of Defence (in Whitehall or in military bases).

The 20,000 Britons stationed in Germany for the past 65 years will be brought home or deployed to one of the only three permanent bases away from Great Britain, in Cyprus, Gibraltar and the Falklands.

On top of these ‘casualties’, the Army will lose 40% of its Challenger 2 main battle tanks, as well as 35% of heavy artillery pieces. The Navy will scrap 4 frigates – too bad for London that Romania is also bankrupt and unable to purchase any of them :-)

The RAF has to put up with the fact that, out of an initial order to Boeing of 22 Chinook helicopters, the UK will only buy 12. Weren’t these aircraft desperately needed by the troops in Afghanistan?

The sole operational British aircraft carrier (Ark Royal) will be decommissioned, and a new one will not be launched sooner than 2019. Last, but by no means least, by 2027/2028, the UK will have only 2 nuclear submarines armed with Trident nuclear missiles, instead of the 4 it has today.

In spite of these cuts, the FCO propaganda and William Hague himself claim that Britain “will still remain a military power of first rank.” I couldn’t possibly agree or disagree with this claim, as I am no military expert.

It appears likely that Britain won’t miss the lost tanks soon, but I don’t know about the rest, nor about effects of the cuts upon the morale of the service personnel. Will they feel that slimmed down forces could be more efficient?

Have the pro-American Cameron and the pro-European Clegg earned the trust of the commanders that they know what they are doing?

[For all the posts on this blog go to/Pentru toate postările de pe acest blog mergi la: Contents/Cuprins]