Unnecessary Wheeling and Dealing

We are just over two months away from finding out whether a swarm of blaring vuvuzelas will mix with tomahawk chops in the United States for either the 2018 or 2022 FIFA World Cup. If England's Football Association have their way, the US shouldn't bother with 2018.

A spokesman for The FA said today he expects the US Soccer Federation to withdraw their bid for the 2018 World Cup and focus on 2022. In response to that England would, to quote the spokesman, "almost certainly withdraw from 2022." (Which is easy for him to say, as the United States remains the only non-UEFA nation still bidding on 2018, and FIFA rules now prohibit a continent from hosting consecutive cups.) However, Go USA Bid executive director David Downs issued assurances that the US remain in the hunt for either cup.

I'm not sure why England would vocally suggest the US opt out of the 2018 matchup, considering the fracas that nearly scuttled their bid four months ago. While FIFA rejected the claims of bribery made by soon-to-be-ousted FA chief Lord Triesman, it was still quite foolish to make such an accusation.

With the FIFA evaluation teams completing their tour of all nine candidate nations (or nation pairings, in the case of Spain/Portugal and Benelux), the decision rests on them. In the meantime, Americans eager to support the bid can continue to make it known by visiting the bid's Web site.

The Day I Reaffirmed A Belief I've Held Since Eighth Grade

It has taken far too long for me to ruminate about this, with so many angles, aspects, and division among peers as well as various groupings across our diverse nation. But I've finally settled on one angle: the surefire first-person confessional.

The controversy surrounding Park51 (née Cordoba House, née "Mosque" "at" "Ground Zero", née Burlington Coat Factory) has echoed back and forth from media outlets across the U.S. and beyond the past two months, especially with demonstrations (abandoned or not) that coincided with the ninth anniversary of the atrocities of 9/11. And during my trip to New York last month (photos on the blog's fan page on Facebook) I took a walk down Park Place toward the run-down five-story Italian Renaissance building. And there it stood: the flashpoint testing religious tolerance in the U.S., flanked by a 15-story skyscraper to its right with an AT&T store, another 15-story skyscraper that houses an Amish goods shop, all facing south toward a parking garage and even taller building, across the street where taxis advertising adult entertainment venues in the area cruise.

After standing across the street under construction scaffolding, overhearing a couple people also snapping pictures and talking about the proposed project while two demonstrators utilized their First Amendment rights to show support for freedom of religion, I continued my one-man tour of Lower Manhattan with, oddly enough, one of my core political beliefs re-affirmed.

I, for lack of a better term or way to spin this, am a Tenther.

I believe that problems involving the economic and social well-being of a community and its members are best solved at localized levels. Broad-stroke applications like No Child Left Behind, health care reform, Kelo v. New London, and every perverted interpretation of the interstate commerce clause conceivable, are one-size-fits-all attempts to graft a federal solution onto what are really situations that differ from state to state and district to district. I make no qualms about being among the 70 percent of Missouri voters who backed Proposition C last month.

However, unlike most of the newfound Tenthers out there, I accept a critical tangent of this belief: what's best for one state is not necessarily best for another. Which is why I, as a Missourian, really have no tangible reason to weigh in on whether a New York organization should be allowed by a governing body in New York to build a facility that serves Muslims who live in New York. While I may be able to transplant myself with ease in this great country from state to state as the economy and I please, I am no more a resident of Lower Manhattan than the many pundits, preachers, and politicos who have railed against this proposal. Zoning has long been a local issue, and the boards that voted to allow construction of Park51 did not lose or cede jurisdiction of Lower Manhattan, nor did similar boards serving Arlington or Somerset County, Pa., after 19 (insert choice expletives to your heart's content) terrorists committed the most brazen attack on our country.

Now, I must admit that I did have my reservations about this project. It's within a five-minute walk of Ground Zero, ten if you get stopped at every crosswalk signal and you actually abide by them. The previous name for the project, Cordoba House, was criticized by a politico from Georgia, who said the name commemorated the forcible conversion of the Spanish city of Córdoba during the eighth century. But then I find out the inspiration for the project is a Jewish community center that's operated in Manhattan's Upper East Side since the 1920s, and that a mosque has operated in Lower Manhattan since before the twin towers opened forty years ago. And then there's the strip club advertising itself on hundreds of New York taxis, just one block behind the site.

Instead of figuring out a way to spin a baptism story out of my taking swimming lessons at the YMCA on Vivion Road as a kid, it occurred to me the dangerous precedent that could be set by my supposedly fellow Tenthers, were their vehement objections to a project in New York, waged from far-flung corners of the U.S., enough for a local decision to be overturned. Would they be keen to people from outside Alaska or Georgia telling them what their local bodies they can and can't zone? Would they be willing to cede to a federal government, one that they repeatedly call out of touch with the electorate and having too much power already, the right to determine what is appropriate to place 1000 feet away from a site of historical significance?

If (God, Allah and/or any other deity or deities forbid) a harrowing scar were to be delivered onto Kansas City or St. Louis, I would want anything proposed in its place, be it a memorial garden, Methodist chapel, mosque, Mormon temple, mega-screen complex, or museum where visitors can observe the anhydration of decorative mastic epoxies, to be debated on and decided by our local bodies, free from undue influence by political & publicity-craving forces who have no vested interest in our day-to-day lives. This has been, and should remain, a local decision. And as non-residents of that local jurisdiction, we must respect what has been done, lest we prepare ourselves for people from outside our communities to tell us what not to build in our own back yard.

"Like the Mississippi, it just keeps rolling along. Let it roll!"

Throughout Britain, particularly London and the South East, commemorations have taken place to mark the 70th anniversary of a speech before the House of Commons by Winston Churchill. In that speech, Winston Churchill uttered the famous line: "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."

The speech, which gave rise to the nickname "The Few" for the RAF personnel who piloted Spitfires, Hurricanes and Lancasters over the skies of Britain to repel the Nazis' aerial assault of Britain, was generally a state of the war report from the Prime Minister. Churchill spends the first third of the speech detailing technological differences between the two world wars, stating that while casualties in the Battle of Britain were one-fifth that of World War I in the first year, the focus had changed from being an exclusively military struggle to total warfare against civilians, aimed at weakening the British resolve.

As Churchill lauded "The Few" he went on to detail the democracies that had fallen under the power of the German blitzkrieg, and assured them that they had a champion in Great Britain and the United States.

The end of the speech, which rarely is discussed in contrast to "The Few", contains a poignant close from Churchill. As he brings up the need for Britain and the United States to come together in common dialogue and defence, he said:

These are important steps. Undoubtedly this process means that these two great organisations of the English-speaking democracies, the British Empire and the United States, will have to be somewhat mixed up together in some of their affairs for mutual and general advantage.

For my own part, looking out upon the future, I do not view the process with any misgivings. I could not stop it if I wished; no one can stop it. Like the Mississippi, it just keeps rolling along. Let it roll. Let it roll on full flood, inexorable, irresistible, benignant, to broader lands and better days.

A year later, with the Battle of Britain won by "The Few" and the Nazi war machine setting its sights east toward Moscow and Stalingrad, Churchill would meet with Franklin D. Roosevelt off the coast of Newfoundland to hammer out the Atlantic Charter. Not only did it provide a foundation on which the United Nations was formed five years later in San Francisco, it also put the final touches onto a special relationship, torn by the Revolution and War of 1812, reunited during World War I, and drawing even closer as two nations divided by common language began to reaffirm their inherent ties.

It was a special relationship that Churchill would grow to appreciate, giving one of his most famous speeches in 1946 on the campus of Westminster College in Fulton. And the United States would pay him back in 1963, as Congress would bestow Churchill with honourary citizenship. (Granted, as Churchill's mother was an American, he could have sought U.S. citizenship outright had he wanted to.)

Indeed today is a day of reflection, not only for the efforts of "The Few" to preserve their country, but their role in helping Churchill defend democracy from a deranged dictatorship and establish the core of the special relationship that continues to ebb and flow through American and British affairs to this day.

It's a Quarter After One, I'm Tanked At The Red Lion…

I began typing this entry 35,000 feet over Cedar Point, at the same time two lads from Tennessee and their gorgeous lead singer wrapped up a three-day sojourn across the pond, building on the unprecedented chart success they’re achieving.

Lady Antebellum’s trip to Britain may appear fruitless, performing only one concert, and that one to 2000 devoted fans at Shepherd’s Bush Empire in London, but for those pining for the world to embrace the trademark twang of country, that close-knit concert may very well be country music’s equivalent to The Beatles’ landmark 1964 debut concert on The Ed Sullivan Show and at old Shea Stadium.

And Britain may have just warmed up to the format, in particular the three members of Lady Antebellum. In addition to BBC Radio One regularly performing tracks from their newest album Need You Now, the trio of Dave Haywood, Charles Kelley and Hillary Scott appeared on BBC One’s Breakfast Show for a live interview segment lasting just over seven minutes. Need You Now, including the title song and “I Run To You”, have soared on the UK’s charts, echoing the success the trio have registered in the US over the likes of Justin Bieber, Rhianna and fellow country starlet Taylor Swift.

Listing The Beatles as among their influences, and joking that they were once mistaken for Kings of Leon, Lady Antebellum are the epitome of not just the world’s earbuds acclimating to songs about mama, drinking, pickup trucks, and jailhouse blues, but equally of country music evolving from its distinctly rural American roots. Much as the Mississippi delta gave rise to jazz and blues, genres quickly embraced and adapted by legendary British rockers including Eric Clapton and Mick Jagger, country music has now reached a point where it has openly influenced, and been influenced by, the bass beats of classic rock, the somber, soothing tones of adult contemporary, and even the occasional jolt from heavy metal.

Even as The New York Times declared country music dead in 1985, performers rooted in church choirs and old guitar standards began branching out from behind the friendly confines of the WSM microphone at the Grand Ole Opry. Artists, ranging from classic Southern Belles like Reba McEntire to transplants like the Canadian Shania Twain, explored the inclusion of traits from beyond the commonly acceptable bounds of country music. As country music caught on across North America, so too did the outside influences. Shania drew some flack for a song which, for all intents and purposes, could hardly be classified as country. Reba built on her success by way of launching a television series on The WB (and later The CW), running for six seasons. Reba's crossover appeal furthered when she released an album of duets in 2007, featuring Kelly Clarkson, Don Henley, Carole King and Justin Timberlake among her collaborators.

In the past two years alone, country music has reached a point where it is, for all intents and purposes, attached to the mainstream as much as hip-hop and R&B. Taylor Swift’s near-bubble gum pop appeal, with chart success on country and mainstream charts, drew a less than positive response from a certain rapper on a certain live music award broadcast. Soft rock crooners Darius Rucker (of Hootie and the Blowfish fame) and Uncle Kracker have found their ways on the country charts by virtue of including just enough twang for country music stations' programming directors to add them to their playlists.

Many of these artists, though, can also look back to successes achieved by rock-and-roll pioneers such as Elvis and Boddy Holly, or can look to the enduring image of Jim Reeves. Over 45 years after his umtimely passing in a plane crash en route to Nashville, Reeves' booming bass voice against gentle background music continues to resonate in the songbooks of Britain, Ireland, and South Africa, where he spent several months touring in 1963.

Could Lady Antebellum's newfound appeal across the pond result in the potential inclusion of up to 400 million fans, or maybe some Johnny Cash knockoffs in future Eurovision Song Contests? Or has country music morphed into the point where it is now part of the Simon Cowell-fronted-but-really-controlled-by-Sony-investors cookie-cutter music machine, defined only by an artist's preferred training, or what a publicist believes would best market the artist? These are questions that not only tug at the ear of devoted and occasional music fans, but also probe deeper into society.

Whether British fans of Lady Antebellum will delve deeper into the rich history of Country music and find a new genre of their own liking, or start grouping their tracks with Little Boots because both artists play regularly on Heart, will be a test of time. If past results are any indication, though, it will likely be the latter. I've yet to hear Mix 93 or Z100 play anything by Lena or Alexandra Burke.

Freshmen MPs vulnerable to Foot-In-Mouth Disease

Funny how an outside candidate keen to make himself accessible now, as an elected official, wants to cut off access.

Over the last month Dominic Raab, the Conservative representing Esher and Walton in the House of Commons, has called on a political advocacy blog to pull his e-mail address from their Web site. Raab has told media outlets that his office is being flooded with e-mails from across Britain and that they're unable to handle the volume of correspondence.

The blog in question, 38degrees, bills itself on enabling concerned citizens to sign petitions and pursue group action on various issues, ranging from recalling MPs who may have misused their position to local planning issues including proposed CAFOs and housing developments. For the past month, 38degrees' operators and Raab have exchanged e-mails concerning Raab's request and made those e-mails public.

Raab has taken offence to his inbox being flooded with hundreds of e-mails from concerned citizens across the length and breadth of Britain sending the same form letter advocating for the adoption of the Alternative Vote, the referendum which is slated to occur in May 2011. In the e-mail exchange with 38degrees, Raab has noted that he would welcome responding to individual e-mails from advocates of AV. Both Raab and 38degrees say they have advice from Parliament's Information Commissioner backing their stand on Raab's request.

Now, on the surface, this request appears idiotic. Raab is a public figure now. His e-mails, if they're conducted from a government e-mail account, are subject to opens records laws. (That said, Raab listed a Yahoo! e-mail address on his candidate profile, and if he is still using that Yahoo! account for government business, then that's a slightly different issue here.) And Raab asking people to stop e-mailing him, be it to his Yahoo! or Commons e-mail address, is like asking the Niagara River to stop flowing over Horseshoe Falls.

What his office can do, like what several reps here in Missouri do, is set up a generic auto-reply that acknowledges receipt of an e-mail and explicitly state on there that unless the issue is raised by a resident in his constituency (as verified by post codes) there's a good chance the e-mail won't be replied to or actually be seen by the MP. If an e-mail did not include a post code or did not match those that reside in the constituency (in Raab's situation those would be KT10, KT11 and KT12), then the office staff could label it as low priority. This would be to ensure that the highest priority emails—from constituents and media—would be given top priority.

What concerns me about 38degrees, and what may be distressing Raab, is whether the e-mails he's receiving via 38degrees' mailing system (which is modelled on progressive grassroots sites like MoveOn.org) is mailing the same form letter to all 650 MPs, regardless of the petitioner's given constituency. While it is useful to generate large numbers as to show national opinion on certain issues, an MP's priority must be his/her constituency. If the MP is to be a delegate representing the wishes of his/her residents (as opposed to a trustee), then he/she must be able to discern the voices of his/her neighbours over those of adamant campaigners.

While Web sites like 38degrees, MoveOn.org, (and even Missives from Missouri, to a lesser extent) allow regular citizens to become aware and actively involved in issues affecting their lives, citizens need to be able to think and form opinions for themselves, rather than just fill in a few boxes and go back to watching EastEnders or iCarly. Rather than remaining a sheep under the stewardship of a new shepherd, a truly active citizen needs to be able to articulate their view and personal experiences relating to such issues. Only then will the power of new media reach its optimum.

Divided Attention, Dog Days of Summer Edition

Just under a fortnight ago I attended the wedding of two college friends. Not only was it the first wedding I attended since things across the pond went the way of Labour when Michael Foot handled the helm, but it was also a mini-reunion of sorts with several peers I hadn't seen since my years at Truman. In particular, I had the pleasure of becoming acquainted with the husband of one of those peers. It was a most enjoyable and informative conversation for both of us, and the insight I gained from it has given me a chance to reflect on, well, the general direction of this blog. Or should I say indirection?

But again, my attention is divided. Much like how I'm split between covering the news of home and recent happenings in Blighty, city leaders in KCMO are split between what exactly to ask voters to approve with the public safety sales tax due for renewal before June 2011. The quarter-cent levy currently goes towards improving the police department's facilities and equipment, including the new police academy and Shoal Creek Patrol building just outside Pleasant Valley. Several on the city council, backed by police chief Jim Corwin, want to retain the sales tax for this use.

However, Mayor Mark Funkhouser wants to put more police officers on the streets. Citing citizen concerns raised to him, the mayor would instead like to augment the sales tax to foot the salaries of 100 officers, and extend its duration for 20 years rather than 15.

At first glance, I'm inclined to back more police on the beat. That means more eyes watching out for crime, traffic infractions, and kids in need of Royals baseball cards. Unfortunately, the mayor's desire to hire extra personnel by way of a sales tax generates two major problems.

The first problem, more critically, is proposing a sales tax with a set duration (let alone a sales/use tax) to increase the number of personnel serving a critical need for the city. Say you're one of the 100 officers brought in as a result of a passed sales tax aimed at hiring more officers. When that tax expires and citizens don't renew it, or sales revenue plummets more than it already has, your job probably isn't that secure. Even if the advocacy groups and unions do all they can to make sure you get your salary, generate bad PR for the city, etc., it would still compromise the force's effectiveness the same way dumping 100 officers or slashing a different part of the budget would. And further, this fear could easily be played upon by civic leaders looking to subvert such a tax into a gravy train for pet projects, or rely heavily on this tax as to free up money from other sources for said gravy train pet projects.

The second problem, at the moment, is that in Missouri it's not legal to propose such a tax. Until August 28. That's when Senate Bill 981, sponsored by Democrat Victor Callahan of Independence, becomes law. It would allow Kansas City to pass a sales tax of up to one percent to fund salaries of police officers. Unfortunately, while parts of the bill contain emergency clauses, this particular provision did not. Which is problematic as, for the measure to appear on the November ballot, the city must approve ballot wording by the 19th.

As the city is not on the same page on this critical subject, I suspect that voters will face a desperation-induced ballot measure come April, shortly after KCMO voters are worn out from a municipal election that still operates on the oddest dates for elections in Missouri.

Strange Bedfellows At The Westminster Motel

The strange bedfellows stemming from Britain's nascent Coalition government continue to develop. This week, it's a pairing of Labour's shadow cabinet with 50 backbencher Tories determined to quash the proposed May 2011 referendum on the alternative vote system. Their reasons, largely based on political dogma, are naturally divergent.

The ballot measure, which will go before voters across the UK on 5 May upon passage of the enabling legislation, will eliminate the first-past-the-post system in favour of ranking candidates in order of preference. The system is already in place for electing the mayor of greater London and in local elections across Wales and Scotland, the latter of which will occur simultaneously.

The 50 Tory backbenchers – principally Eurosceptics and right-wing politicians that could pull off a mass defection to UKIP if they really wanted to – oppose this system, believing that first-past-the-post has been a tried-and-true institution that can keep fringe candidates out of Parliament. But instead of going along with their party's coalition agreement, to let the people decide on what system they want, these stuck-in-the-mud traditionalists have every intention of maintaining the status quo.

It must be noted that Cameron, in spite of his willingness to allow the vote, will campaign against it. However, as part of the Coalition agreement between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, the Conservative plurality agreed to let there be a vote on electoral reform (as championed by the Liberal Democrats) in exchange for the Tories' desire to reduce the number of seats in the House of Commons and ensure an equal number of residents in each constituency.

As a result, Labour's leadership, which championed the Alternative Vote (and even passed the original proposal just six months ago) indicate that they may sign onto a motion to oppose the bill alongside the rebel Tory MPs. They fear that the Lib-Con coalition may gerrymander the new constituencies to divide Labour strongholds and render improbable any chance of a Labour or even LibDem government from forming in the near future. Naturally, it's fodder for generating sound-byte rebuttals, as Cameron was quick to call Labour "backtrackers" and "opportunistic".

With Labour's prospective U-Turn on the proposal, should it pass through Parliament only the Liberal Democrats (among the Westminster Three) will be on board with the Alternative Vote, even as they indicated preference to dumping single-seat constituencies in favour of the Single Transferable Vote system, as used to elect legislators in Northern Ireland.

The Coalition That Gaffes Together…

Were America's 24-hour newsrooms not so enthralled over LiLo's mug shots or when Mel Gibson gets his next one, they might have picked up on these two nuggets that occurred during Prime Minister David Cameron's trip to Washington this week.

First, the Prime Minister admitted to Sky News' Adam Boulton that Britain, while not a pushover, was the junior partner in the special relationship with the U.S. What really irked British media though was not Cameron's admission of this generally accepted reality, but how he qualified it.

Cameron suggested that the UK was also the junior partner in 1940. While this might play right into the hand of my jingoist compatriots who to this day insist America saved Britain's hide in World War II, there's a slight historical problem with this.

As 'The Few' took to the air to defend Britain's skies against Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe, the States remained on the sidelines, limiting itself to not-so-covert assistance of the Allies by way of the Lend-Lease Act. The resolve of 'The Few' prevailed when Germany formally abandoned the Battle of Britain in December 1940, months before Roosevelt and Churchill would meet off the coast of Newfoundland to promulgate the Atlantic Charter, and a solid year before Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. Even after America's "day of infamy", the United States only declared on Japan, which resulted in an invitation to the European theatre through Germany and Italy declaring on the U.S. on 11 December 1941.

Doesn't sound like a senior partner to me.

The staffers at 10 Downing, though, were more pressed into action over another gaffe that had occurred 12 hours earlier at the lectern of the House of Commons. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, standing in for Cameron during this week's Prime Minister's Questions, tussled words with Labour's Jack Straw, who served as foreign secretary and Lord Chancellor during Labour's past 13 years at the helm. In an effort to score a political one-up on the opposition amid a charged climate lacking decorum, Clegg declared: "Maybe he one day - perhaps we will have to wait for his memoirs - could account for his role in the most disastrous decision of all, which is the illegal invasion of Iraq."

Slight problem: a majority of Conservatives, including a freshman MP from the constituency of Witney named David Cameron, backed Tony Blair's government in joining the U.S. in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The Liberal Democrats, when Clegg was representing Yorkshire in the European Parliament, were the largest party in Britain to oppose the war and declare it illegal.

What followed was a stark lesson for everyone running the Coalition government. 10 Downing attempted in vain to qualify Clegg's comments as his own, and then refused to counter them as Conservatives went on the counter-offensive. This also generated confusion over who exactly will declare whether or not British involvement in the overthrow of Saddam Hussein was illegal, as a spokesman for the inquiry looking into the lead up to the conflict said its findings will not include an explicit statement of legality. Further, Clegg's statement from the dispatch box, were it to become a legal reality, could provide grounds to pursue criminal cases against current and former Government officials and even British troops who served in Iraq since March 2003.

While this may not prove too much a dent in the viability of the Cameron-Clegg Coalition, the slip-up in putting party platform over Government position, alongside the repeated yet draining efforts of Commons Speaker John Bercow to maintain order during the first PMQs with a Liberal party member at the lecturn, will give the Coalition reason to re-assess their strategy when dealing with a regrouping Labour opposition and disgruntled backbenchers. For Clegg, it is a stark reminder of the importance to represent the views of the Coalition as a whole when he speaks in place of the Prime Minister. Besides, there now exists a once-monthly session for questions directed to the Deputy Prime Minister, where leeway may occur for where his views as the "junior partner" of the Coalition may differ from the Prime Minister.