The DYDA DISPATCHES

Rhodri Morgan leads the way

2009-11-24T16:40:00.003Z

Rhodri Morgan & Co lead the way on further devolved powers with this ground breaking and progressive response to the All Wales Convention's report.

All is well with the world

2009-11-24T13:46:00.005Z

WORLD leaders are are overjoyed to hear that future First Minister Carwyn Jones will be joining them in Copenhagen once the formality of being elected leader of the Welsh Labour Party is behind him.

THE first collision of proton beams in the Large Hadron Collider has taken place and WE'RE ALIVE! WE'RE ALIVE! WE'RE ALIVE! WE'RE ALIVE! WE'RE ALIVE! WE'RE ALIVE! WE'RE ALIVE!!!

Eurobscurity

2009-11-20T11:16:00.003Z

Just when you thought the European Union couldn't get any more obscure...bring on the non-entities

Van Rompuy's credentials are impressive indeed, as the EUObserver notes:

Mr Van Rompuy, from the centre-right political family, is a trained economist and has been running Belgium for less than a year. He writes Haiku (Japanese verse) and is known for his low-key style, which includes a line in self-deprecatory humour and caravan holidays.

Wow.

Van Rompuy is also renowned for his opposition to Turkey becoming a member of the EU. Turkey, he says, is not and never has been a part of Europe - contrary to what geography and history may tell you. There can be no place for a secular Muslim nation in a secular Christian Europe, it goes against our enlightened Christian roots. After all, what has Islam ever done for Europe - apart from preserving and developing science and philosophy when the Church wanted to burn all our books and kill freedom of thought?

The EU now has one number for foreign policy claims EU Grand Vizier Jose Barroso. Granted nobody will know who they're talking to, but Hillary Clinton has welcomed the development, as she'll only have to deal with one lightweight in Europe from now on.

Thursday news

2009-11-19T10:29:00.003Z

From the EUObserver

EU commissioner hopefuls will not win the approval of centre-right MEPs if they are considered to have collaborated with repressive Communist regimes or with governments 'tainted by corruption,' the largest group in the European Parliament has indicated.

Unless they're Italian, of course.

From EurActiv

European leaders are meeting in Brussels for an extraordinary summit today (19 November) to appoint their first ever permanent president and an EU high representative for foreign affairs. However, citizens are showing little interest in who their leaders will be, a round-up from EurActiv's media network reveals.

Hardly surprising when the man tipped to become president is a complete non-entity (as well as a Smeagol lookalike). You want thrills, choose Blair.

From WalesOnline

THE Conservatives are so “obsessed” with stopping Tony Blair from becoming EU President, they are acting against Britain’s interests, Europe Minister Chris Bryant said yesterday.

The Rhondda MP said the Tories had in effect backed Mr Blair’s rival, Belgian Herman Van Rompuy – who favours the European integration approach the Conservatives oppose and has suggested that the European Parliament should be given tax-levying powers.

Bryant has a point. Tony, after all, is the PM Dave and friends gave a standing ovation in the Commons.

From WalesOnline

THE first decade of devolution in Wales has transformed the nation’s relationship with the world and created a new confidence, First Minister Rhodri Morgan declared in one of the last speeches before he retires as Labour leader.

He said: “Far from becoming more inward looking, devolution initially forced us as a nation to put our heads above the parapets...

“Our determination to defend our sense of political, social and cultural identity risked appearing to others as an inwardness and a willingness always to blame others, rather than take responsibility for our own affairs, and our own future.”

Emphasising Wales’ place at the heart of Europe, he said: “In population terms Wales is bigger than five member states and not very much smaller than another three.

“Malta has a population hardly bigger than Cardiff, but has a direct seat at the table and access to the entire EU decision-making machinery.”

This speech was brought to you courtesy of Tŷ Gwynfor. Apparently.

Tripping over tongues

2009-11-16T09:56:00.008Z

Edwina Hart on the Welsh language

"I’d also find it very useful if I could speak some other languages like Bengali or Chinese when I’m in the Swansea community.

“But at the end of the day, we also have to recognise that we are a multicultural society with a lot of diverse cultures, so I don’t think that this is an issue.”

This is why she so rarely gives interviews: they require her to think and talk at the same time.

Bevan backs Lewis

2009-11-13T11:32:00.004Z

A clairvoyant working for the Lewis4Labour campaign team has revealed that Aneurin Bevan has given his backing to Huw Lewis.

Asked who Mr Bevan (deceased) wished to see leading the Welsh Labour Party, the incorporeal former Health Minister guided clairvoyant Megan Jarvis' hand to the letters 'H' and 'L' on her Ouija board.

Furthermore, when asked whether his support for Mr Lewis was due to the Merthyr AM's pledges to create a Welsh Opportunities Fund for deprived children, forge a social partnership between government, business and trade unions, deliver an all party accord on climate change, safeguard the Welsh NHS to improve outcomes for patients, build more and better affordable housing and chances of revitalising the Labour Party in Wales, Mr Bevan (deceased) replied in the affirmative with a resounding 'Y' while shaking the table.

"This is an exciting development," said a spokesperson for Team Lewis.

Asked for his opinion of the other two candidates, Mr Bevan (deceased) replied 'F'.

Reagan, Gorby and the Wall

2009-11-13T10:37:00.004Z

Russia Today discusses some of the misconceptions some people have concerning the roles of Gorbachev and Reagan in the fall of the Wall, yet still manages to further the misconception that the fall of the Wall, the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the USSR were one and the same event.

Here, on film, is how the Cold War really ended...

EU president: nomination process stumbles on

2009-11-13T09:34:00.005Z

Tony Blair: 58 votes (UK & Italy)

Jan-Peter Balkenende: 40 votes (Netherlands & Poland)

Herman Van Rompuy: 12 votes (Belgium)

John Bruton: 7 votes (Ireland)

Jean-Claude Juncker: 4 votes (Luxembourg)

Toomas Hendrik Ilves: 4 votes (Estonia)

Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga: 4 votes (Latvia)

Remaining votes: 216

The EU's eastern member states are pushing for the nomination process involved in selecting both the EU Council president and High Representative to be made public. Transparency would indeed make a nice change, however it seems that the motive behind the call is to ensure that at least one of the posts is filled by an Eastern European candidate.

When they club together, the Eastern Europeans like to present themselves as being half the EU. The votes don't back them up though. Put together the voting power of the East only just about equals that of the Big Four - France, Germany, Italy and the UK. The combined voting power of the West or Old EU outweighs the East/New EU by 2 to 1.

Meanwhile Belgian Van Rompuy is still being refered to as the "favourite", based apparently on no evidence whatsoever other than that Brussels happens to be in Belgium and therfore there are a lot of Belgians in Brussels. In reality the only member of the EU Council certain to vote for Herman Van Rompuy is, well, Herman Van Rompuy, which doesn't exactly put him in the lead.

Kinnocks back Lewis

2009-11-12T11:21:00.003Z

The Kinnocks have given their backing to Huw Lewis in the crawl to become First Minister. Neil will no doubt be able to give Huw a few useful tips on how to win an election.

Berlin: before, during and after the Wall

2009-11-12T09:43:00.004Z

Berlin in 1936

Berlin in 1945

Communist rally of the "Free German Youth" in Berlin, 1950

The Wall (1962)

East Berlin in 1972

Berlin today

It wasn't the Hoff wot did it

2009-11-11T10:20:00.004Z

A tired and emotional David Hasselhoff confirms that he wasn't in fact responsible for the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Alles klar?

Lewis leads in Lewis campaign poll

2009-11-11T07:52:00.003Z

"Lewis leads" says Team Lewis.

Elsewhere God, speaking through the Pope, has confirmed that the Pope is infallible.

Speculation gone mad

2009-11-11T04:14:00.007Z

Speculation over who will become EU president continues. Like in the contest to become First Minister for Wales, speculation is fuelled by who supports whom: the 'who' in the case of Wales being those who have a vote to cast, be they politician, union or just an average member of the Labour Party Wales. In contrast the European 'who' is in the main somebody who doesn't have any say in the matter at all.

In other words, most people are talking out of their arses.

There are 27 individuals who have a say in who becomes EU president, and those are the 27 EU heads of government, among them the three Benelux premiers (Hmmm, I wonder who they will vote for). Some of those individuals have more votes to cast than others (see below).

The European Socialists in the EP want to see the new EU foreign minister job going to a Socialist, while others point out that as the largest party in the EP, a People's Party man should be president of the Council. Well guess what guys: what MEPs want is neither here nor there; they don't get a vote.

The European People's Party have a majority on the Council too, but Council members couldn't give a hoot about which European party they may be affiliated with. They're heads of government, not MEPs.

The Dutch, Belgian and Luxembourgian premiers all want the job, hence their opposition to Tony Blair. The British and Italian premiers support Blair. The French president can't make his mind up as to whether he supports Blair, Felipe Gonzalez or someone else. The Irish premier is caught between Blair and John Bruton. The Polish currently seem to favour the Dutch PM.

Then there's the speculation as to who should be the new EU foreign minister, which is even more absurd. European Socialists (not the ones who actually have any say in the matter, of course) seem to be hell bent on awarding the job to David Milliband, who doesn't even want the job in the first place.

Brussels seems to be full of headless chickens these days. When an Irish betting firm placed Blair as an odds-on favourite the pro-Balkenede/Van Rompuy/Juncker factions had a fit and went into an anti-Blair overdrive. "Wait" they protested, "a poll in the Times came out against Blair."

Question: Since when did either Irish betting firms or readers of the Times have a say in the decisions of the EU Council?

Answer: Never.

THE VOTES

Germany, France, Italy, United Kingdom 29 votes each

Spain, Poland 27 votes each

Romania 14 votes

Netherlands 13 votes

Belgium, Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary, Portugal 12 votes each

Austria, Bulgaria, Sweden 10 votes each

Denmark, Ireland, Lithuania, Slovakia, Finland 7 votes each

Cyprus, Estonia, Latvia, Luxembourg, Slovenia 4 votes each

Malta 3 votes

TOTAL 345 votes

VOTES SO FAR

Tony Blair: 58 votes (UK & Italy)

Jan-Peter Balkenende: 40 votes (Netherlands & Poland)

Herman Van Rompuy: 12 votes (Belgium)

John Bruton: 7 votes (Ireland)

Jean-Claude Juncker: 4 votes (Luxembourg)

Remaining votes: 224

The new president will be chosen on the 19th of November according to the website EUObserver

Bye bye bye Delilah

2009-11-10T10:41:00.003Z

Video made by Team Carwyn

Remember Peter Hain getting excited about Aneurin Glyndŵr?

"Our aim is to build a network of progressive people who are interested in politics, but are not obsessed with it. That is the one danger of blogging, it can become the preserve of a self-appointed elite. We already have the core activists, what we need to do now is reach out and mobilise the millions of people who, although they might never go to a Labour Party meeting, will work hard to stop the Tories getting into power again."

Well, like Glyndŵr himself, it has disappeared into the mists...of Welsh cyberspace.

It appears the blog has gone the way of the Norwegian blue, replaced by an empty "Online resource for Labour Party Members in Wales".

However, it doesn't tell Welsh Labour members how they can register to enter the site. Bummer.

Those mobilised millions Hain talked about must be well gutted.

Hat tip to Vaughan.

How the Wall was brought down

2009-11-10T08:05:00.004Z

Günter Schabowski, the Politbüro member whose cock-up on live TV led only hours later to the fall of the Berlin Wall

A couple of quick questions in an otherwise dull press conference broadcast live on TV; add an ill-informed state minister to the mix and one brief cock-up later the fate of the GDR was sealed.

Eingemauert

2009-11-10T01:45:00.001Z

Via

EU President odds

2009-11-10T00:48:00.008Z

Who will be EU president? Ladbrokes has Belgian premier and Gollum lookalike Herman Van Rompuy as favourite.

Looking at Ladbrokes' list of 25 contenders, nearly half of them already have jobs one would have thought of as being too important to cast aside in order to become chairman of the EU Council.

Three of the four favourites are currently heads of national governments. Specifically the three Benelux governments. Evidently being Prime Minister of any of the Benelux countries isn't all it's cracked up to be.

It has long been suspected that the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg aren't really proper countries, and their premiers seem to be confirming this view with their eagerness to quit their jobs and become president of the EU Council, a job they themselves insist should be nothing more than that of a chairman.

Apparently being nothing more than the chairman of a council nobody outside of Brussels-based politics ever pays much attention to is nevertheless a far more attractive job prospect than heading a Benelux government. I can only presume that wielding political power in the Benelux countries isn't as glamorous as I had previously thought.

I'm sure that Benelux voters will be thrilled to learn that their own premiers are so eager to jump ship.

THE ODDS

Herman Van Rompuy (current Belgian premier) 4/7

Jan-Peter Balkenende (current Dutch premier) 4/1

Tony Blair (former British premier) 5/1

Jean-Claude Juncker (current Luxembourgian premier) 7/1

Paavo Lipponen (former Finnish premier) 10/1
Wolfgang Schüssel (former Austrian premier) 10/1

Fredrik Reinfeldt (current Swedish premier) 12/1

Guy Verhofstadt (former Belgian premier; currently an MEP) 14/1

François Fillon (current French premier) 16/1
Martti Ahtisaari (former Finnish president) 16/1

Dalia Grybauskaitė (current Lithuanian president) 20/1
Felipe Gonzalez (former Spanish premier) 20/1
John Bruton (former Irish premier) 20/1
Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga (former Latvian president) 20/1

Aleksander Kwaśniewski (former Polish president) 25/1
Mary Robinson (former Irish president) 25/1
Poul Nyrup Rasmussen (former Danish premier) 25/1

Anders Fogh Rasmussen (former Danish premier; current Secretary General of NATO) 33/1

Bertie Ahern (former Irish premier) 50/1

Dora Bakoyannis (former Greek cabinet minister) 66/1
Giuliano Amato (former Italian premier) 66/1

Angela Merkel (current German premier) 100/1
Gordon Brown (current British premier) 100/1
Kostas Karamanlis (former Greek premier) 100/1
Václav Havel (former Czech president) 100/1

Mr Cool

2009-11-09T07:43:00.003Z

Huw Lewis tells Edwina and Carwyn to keep their cool.

“I am aware that this is a long campaign and as we move into the closing weeks, there is a very natural risk of battle fatigue extending into petty squabbles among the other two candidates.

“It is important to keep calm, like me, and carry on with the debate about policies and ideas that Welsh Labour needs right now, like I'm doing.”

Ouch.

Croeso

2009-11-09T07:37:00.004Z

Bloody English.

Zwanzig Jahre

2009-11-09T03:05:00.004Z

It wasn't the beginning of the end of the Cold War; the borders of Hungary and Czechoslovakia had been open for months, and one party rule in Poland had ended in August.

Nor was it the end of the end; the USSR would survive for another two years.

It was more the bit in the middle of the end. The bit everybody remembers.

As the Volkspolizei dithered wondering what to do for lack of orders or any warning (the GDR government statement that evening had meant to say the wall would be opened soon, not immediately), West Berliners watched the news in disbelief thinking it was some elaborate prank until finally giving in to curiosity and wondering down to the nearest checkpoint to see for themselves. They didn't have mobile phones or Twitter back then, you see.

Fortunately the whole thing went off well, although it came close to being scuppered by a Welshman.

Eight months later Pink Floyd would perform a live concert by the Berlin Wall to celebrate its fall, but another international pop sensation got there seven months before them...

Sunday

2009-11-08T09:32:00.003Z

Let there be mud

2009-11-07T08:28:00.002Z

Finally, a bit of good old fashioned mud slinging to disturb the ennui of the Welsh Labourship contest, which as far as I can recall began a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

Ghosts to become MEPs

2009-11-06T10:56:00.005Z

With the Lisbon Treaty coming into effect on December 1st, for the first time ever the Dead will be allowed to join the Living in the European Parliament.

15 phantom MEPs will take their places in the EP. They will only have observer status because, being spectral ectoplasmic entities, they can't actually vote. This won't prevent them from receiving the full pay of an MEP. however.

With both the Living and the Dead guaranteed representation on an European level, concern has been raised by those who belong to neither group, who feel left out. Leading representatives of the European vampire community are seeking to emulate their American cousins (see video below) in calling for laws on equal rights to be amended to include the Undead.

MP sexpenses

2009-11-06T10:31:00.004Z

Lembit asks the questions that really matter...to him.

Friday news

2009-11-06T08:51:00.004Z

CARWYN JONES’ campaign manager in the Labour leadership race has denied the Bridgend AM is the favourite to succeed Rhodri Morgan as First Minister.

So who does Leighton think is the favourite then?

TORY leader David Cameron is expected today to announce that a Conservative Government would not block a referendum on law-making powers for the Assembly.

So says the Western Mail in an article with the title Pro-devolution Tories scent victory with Cameron set to say Yes to referendum

Tory MPs and AMs will be free to join both Yes and No campaigns, but any pledge from Cameron to support a referendum represents a victory for pro-devolution Conservatives, as it is an affirmation of their existence after long years of being ignored by their master in London.

Allowing his MPs and AMs to join both campaigns absolves Cameron of any responsibility in the matter, or of having to pick a side. That way he can come out on the side of the eventual winner, whichever campaign that ends up being. The silent weathercock approach.

WELSH Labour politicians will tonight assemble for a crunch meeting that could determine the party’s position on holding a referendum.

It probably won't though.