No Sir! We would not take the rap

Experiences at work

If you have been a follower of events on my blogs you would realise that my experiences in my soon to be concluded job have produced insight about the workings of management and staff that militates against due process and needed progress.

You will find in an example below a typical email I addressed to all concerned about an inordinate rush to implement a half-baked idea in order to gain kudos that would fade as the problems and cracks begin to show up just soon after it has been declared a success.

I would hope that my 15 years experience in IT would count for something, though I find it interesting also when my younger boss speaks in that kind of time frame, you’ll think he finished university at 13 - but then nothing is impossible.

The Background

As we had done many times before, the team I belong in has been a battering ram to impose, conquer and implement grand schemes of IT prowess. Some have been glaringly successful and others have just been nominally OK.

My boss is not a believer in collaboration; rather, all other existing implementations where we have been called to introduce change are discounted for what we can offer. The main thinking is, if we are not the ones implementing the idea, we are irrelevant and others would be called upon to do the job.

That, one would think is understandable for new projects, but surely, duplicating a process to see who gets there first or better in the same organisation is just wanton wastefulness but the stuff of internal political sophistry, presumably.

In this instance, we were to roll out a desktop platform with the attendant back-end infrastructure to co-exist with an already working setup, but without proper co-operation with the staff in that remote location.

When the boss sent the project team to consult with us about this, he also briefed them against me, saying they would encounter difficulty with me and they should railroad whatever I had to say.

Interesting situation, well, I ask difficult questions and I want sensible answers, I was employed to THINK - that is give expert advice - the day I stop thinking is the day my job is done.

The email below was written in December 2003 and the reply from my boss soon after, his promise to answer properly, the issues I raised was never fulfilled.

The email

Subject: The Project - Some truth explored.

Gentlemen,

After reading all the notes from Austria IT personnel and seeing the urgency to deliver impressed on us over the last few days; there may be one thing not accounted for in all the proceedings and possibly the one that could be at variance to all the political machinery brought into force to execute this project.

Everybody who has a technical interest in the project is doing everything to protect and highlight the quality of our profession judgment, expertise and standard of service we are accustomed to giving our customers.

It is the reason why we would test every facet before we sanction any action as delivered and the same reason they would want detailed insight into every process before they go ahead.

These interests would sometimes run counter to the management purpose because they represent realities closer to the ground than is available in executive overviews or project profiles, difficult to articulate but essential to resolve in order to fulfil all requirements.

This strata of the project is what project managers are supposed to have the responsibility of understanding, recognising and diffusing; serving properly as the communication channels and arbiters of the truth of the situation.

Where this is lacking, we (the technical interests in NL and AT) are called upon by our sides to manufacture excuses or half-truths that put a spin on reality and create the opportunity to be able to blame the other party.

You will all appreciate that we all want to deliver what works and if we are to take lessons we have learnt from the previous deployment; none of this is a turn-key deployment - too many parts are linked together to offer this solution.

Once it goes live we will encounter issues that can only be discovered in THAT live situation. {The problems I had to resolve yesterday evening regarding Office XP and the Anti-Virus are case in point.}

This is why even when everything worked in Region 1 and we cloned the scenarios to all the other 4 regions; they all presented different challenges and we would encounter some challenges with Austria no doubt.

Unfortunately, we have had no opportunity to fully document those challenges since we are still within the deployment phases of the present and have now picked up Austria.

What has not been articulated in this note simply presents food for thought regarding the way we have adopted high-visibility projects.

Regards.

The Reply

I will reply in detailed when ever more time is available, but can state I don't support several of the statements made.

Best regards

The Boss

The Analysis

I have planted thoughts of concern in the minds of about 8 people who received my email and what we get is a lame rebuttal, but carry on regardless of what was said.

Well, hardly 6 hours after my email was read, the outrageously ambitious but unachievable time table for the rollout was first moved back a week, then another 4 weeks within 2 days.

What I find amazing is the inability to marry desire with reality on the part of management, such that having a pilot for any project our team embarks on is considered a luxury.

In the end, we started getting information that this roll out was not as successful as it should be, but this is one time where after all we have done, and continue to do in a conscientious and professional manner.

The blame lies squarely at the feet of the boss for the way he politically mismanaged the issues that could have been better received and accepted if we were allowed to cooperate and collaborate with teams that provide support in the areas where we are introducing change.

Once again, No Sir! Technical solutions cannot make up for failed political and management issues.

I cannot dance to this din

Canary Islands

Having chosen the height of the low-season to visit the Canary Islands for a 2-week holiday, one can be forgiven for having much to comment about in terms of entertainment and activity.

There is not doubt that this time is the most affordable to visit the Islands, it is also the time that many of the businesses chose to take a holiday because business is a trickle rather than a flood.

Basically, the high season is the winter months from about the second-half of September to just after Easter. The signs you see around Gran Canaria in particular are first in Spanish, then in German and sometimes in English.

In German, not because of what I first thought was a Nazi invasion of the 40´s but because the whole of geriatric Germany makes an Exodus to the warmer climes of the Tropics without necessarily being in Africa.

The Canary Islands of which there are 7 mainly is a part of Spain, comprising of 2 states.

The smart thing about the geriatric years is exemplified in a comment made by a septuagenarian from England who said; during the winter months you are either at home trying to keep warm or out here doing every good activity and being utterly youthful with bonhomie. I agree most entirely.

Keep the mix, give me the music

Back to the main topic, I visited a number of clubs or bars which might be pseudo-clubs in the centre of Playa del Ingles which is in the southern tip of Gran Canaria looking for some entertainment or rather music to dance to.

I come from an era when music was a performance created by people doing things with musical instruments rather then chips and electrons cruising through wires and cables to the loudspeaker.

I have found it very difficult to dance to the music I hear in these clubs, because of the following reasons

1. None of the music sounds like what you get from the original singles
2. Neither is the music like what you see on the videos on MTV or the Box, where the performers do their best in formation dancing to sell the music
3. The music or din as it were averages 120 beats per minute, you almost definitely have to be on some drug to find the rhythm with which to synchronise or synchopate

In fact the reason why the whole experience is so alien is because of the advent of something called mixing, the fusion of the original music or sound track with a series of monotonous percussion sounds to create dance music.

Unfortunate as this might seem, I can understand that anyone without African blood probably does not know how to take the rhythm of any sound or original beat to relate effectively with their body movements to create an image of poise and prowess in dancing.

Anything, that deviates from the the formality of ballet through ballroom dancing to the Latin American styles is almost alien to the youth of today, the freestyle they adopt might as well be amateur puppetry with 2 left feet.

However, I have found that the Mancunians for some reason do know how to pick up the rhythm in original music, there is no need to inform they through the 120 beat per minute deafening din excited by pills of ecstasy.

To my memory, only one piece of atrociously bad music has ever been improved upon by this sordid mixing ordeal, that is Cher’s Believe, every other mix I have heard has murdered, depreciated, maligned and jettisoned the quality expressed the artiste in the original output.

The music industry disconnect

The music industry is now caught in a schizophrenic grip of trying to maintain music sales and satisfying this dance music craze.

Whilst, dance music is the rave amongst most disc jockeys, it is really a skill that has moved from an art to a science, and poor science for that matter. A DJ needs a good ear and timing to splice one track into another.

With original sound tracks, that is a literally impossible for people who have no inkling of how music works, however, this is easy if the underlying 120 bpm thing is the medium, persistence of hearing caused by the pneumatic effect of speakers that could bring down the building from the vibration makes it easier to switch tracks without too much of a honed skill.

Though, it can be argued that you have to skilled in a non-skill to be an expert in that non-skill - my view entirely.

Now, do does the music industry expect to survive, if what I buy from the shops and listen to on the TV is corrupted beyond recognition when I go out to the clubs?

The beats I listen to at home which in my mind create the feeling that makes me want to dance, are all muffled out by this viral percussion which is supposed to be my cue to dance - I am at a loss at the logic.

Oh! For a club that just plays the music as it is and DJs who know how to splice the music and keep people on the dance floor. It is a dying or dead art.

Addendum: What is referred to as dance music in this blog is better known as EuroTrash, I can add no better definition to this situation. Euro meaning it is European and trash speaks for itself.

Tolerance as a mindset of choice, prejudice and hypocrisy - Part 2

Finding an English School

One is yet to find a student of English from either Japan or China who has been taught English to secondary school level and been able to speak it fluently.

In Japan especially, where so much emphasis is placed of learning English as a language for greater career opportunities. Japan is an established and developed economy and nation with all the resources necessary to make that work.

One remembers years ago in secondary school when French was taught to us with the brutality of the cane bruises from a psychopathic teacher, it took the fun out of learning a good language and no one picked it up as well as could be expected.

Finding a decent Dutch course

The only people who have had the best induction into the Dutch society have been the foreign spouses of the ruling family, Prince Bernhard and Prince Claus from Germany and Princes Maxima from Argentina, then we have foreigners who are madly in love with their Dutch partners, then the persevering rest who just have to learn Dutch to bring the bacon home.

I am not aware of a cosy learning experience for a language made so difficult not by the tuition, but the by the inflexible practitioners who cannot seem to understand anything said that is not accent-perfect, word-perfect, grammar-perfect and just perfect.

Evidence of this fact also comes from the situation where they cannot understand sentences that mix 2 languages that they speak, it is rather bizarre.

Any learner, after the initial enthusiasm almost always gives up learning when all attempts to speak attract no encouragement.

Everyone switches to English, no matter how bad, we are all forgiving enough to accept what is commonly known as Dinglish - the direct translation of Dutch words into English maintaining Dutch grammar and syntax.

We the Dutch affrim that we are becoming less Dutch

This brings us to an original Dutch idea being promoted as part of the immigration-integration debate that is sweeping Europe.

Until recently, the Dutch and the Netherlands have been feted as the most tolerant Western society. This is not to say that the Dutch are still not tolerant, however, a vociferous minority purporting to convey popular opinion are being quite facetious about what to tolerate.

The brunt of this sweeping Dutch angst is the immigrant; or rather, the non-European, non-Christian, non-Dutch speaking, non-skilled nonentities that are diluting Dutch culture and turning the Dutch into other things but Dutch.

We all know that the argument that gay marriage compromises the sanctity of the institution of marriage is as unfounded as immigrants making the Dutch become more Arabic, Muslim, non-Western or some other inconceivable tosh. See Part 1.

Learn Dutch in your village

Anyway, in a masterstroke of genius, the Dutch have now decided that families from these improper areas cannot be united without mastering Dutch and the culture, that is understandable, only that they have to do this before they can emigrate.

The Dutch, having mastered the art of making money, linking up with foreign cultures, then profited bountifully from slave trade and pulled out before other slave trading nations saw that as a business, would now have the opportunity to set up Dutch assimilation institutions and schools in these nether lands.

Walk down a kasbar in Casablanca, you might happen upon a Dutch school, I am not quite sure of seeing that in the persecuted Berber heartlands.

The core analysis is simply the fact that the Dutch have surreptitiously created an almost insurmountable barrier to entry without clearly stating that a barrier to entry has been created.

Obviously, minorities from Japan, Australia or America are not affected by this barrier considering it might even be better to set up these schools in prosperous countries that can afford good teachers, provide the right amenities and having able and paying customers.

The world ain’t that fair, neither are the Dutch in this case.

Resignation?

The subject of resignation

In continuation of the previous blog I have chosen this topic to illustrate an interesting event that occurred just over a week ago. You can first read my letter and then the commentary that follows.

Dated

Sir,

Notice of resignation

First of all, I want to thank you for the opportunity you gave me over 2 years ago to execute policies for Software Control and Deployment.

Those 2 years have been eventful, interesting, sometimes stressful but very rewarding; they would serve as hallmarks in my career as well as pleasant memories of the responsibilities, the challenges, the successes and the people without whom none of those milestones would have been achievable.

However, everyman eventually has to conduct a radical assessment of their career development and prospects from which decisions of great personal significance have to be made.

In that light, I regret to notify you of my decision to leave the company to seek other career opportunities that align with where I believe my career is directed.

I understand that I have to give a statutory notice of a calendar month bringing my last day of work to the end of next month.

However, I hope you would look favorably on negotiating either an earlier end date or some facility that would allow me to begin an internship with my new deployment as soon as possible.

Also, if by the end of my notice period, no replacement for my responsibilities has been recruited, I would be available to provide an introductory session to help that person settle into the job at no cost.

Once again, thank you very much for the opportunity to work for you and for the company.

Yours sincerely,

Signed

Commentary

During the job market depression of 2002, the only jobs available were in the long-term employee sector; having been a contractor/consultant for 7 years, one had resolved that a number of things would have to give; status, remuneration, and a possible decline in the standard of living one had always been accustomed to, by reason of reduced remuneration.

Just as the days of being paid appearance fees at my old contract waned, I was recommended for this role which offered a stipend, a promise of worthless stock options and a career opportunity of a lifetime. Even one can be forgiven the opportunity for being fooled.

My take home was halved in one stroke.

Wading into the political quagmire was an interesting experience, never had I seen more competition amongst the departments of a company, or rather the pettey tyrants that head these departments than with our competitors.

In fact, by some miracle the company has survived a huge debt burden and Chapter 11, if only the energy spent in useless politicking were pooled to take the company from average to outstanding - I have my hopes and it is possible, I believe in the product and principle, but I wonder about the middle layer that keeps thwarting every new opportunity for self-interest and self aggrandisement.

Anyway, the reasons for my resignation stem from the following events:

1. Last August, I asked to attend a course to improve an area of skill I thought needed more development. It was immediately approved, but once the invoice landed on the manager’s desk, it vegetated, and despite every entreaty to move it on, it just did not happen. In the end, I could not go on the course. Question: How do you get a course approved and still not get to go on it? There were no urgent issues at hand to prevent my attending.
2. Notification of the performance review was sent out by HR in November and this was to take place in mid-January, the seemingly lackadaisical attitude to career development was demonstrated in the fact that the manager as it were forgot to send out the preparatory notes till just 48 hours before the meeting with the lame apology of being busy. The meeting is covered in this Blog, the results would be discussed in a later blog.
3. Having discussed elements of career development especially the fact that my role had settled into routine and the mundane, the boss was still of the inclination that my job provided amazing opportunities. However, I was interested in taking a Masters course in IT, to which he responded completely negatively, offering no support, no encouragement and a grudging recommendation that explicitly said the company was offering no financial assistance or time off for my study. Typically, the cult of the overbearing manager should at times read the policies that accompany statements that make. I was instead advised to take the short courses on Skillport rather than a Masters degree. Looks like this ia s dead-end job, for as long as I have this man as my manager.
4. I made 3 attempts to demonstrate my vision of the Software Control & Deployment for my company which in fact has an enterprise environment. All were presented to my boss for his assessment and apart from minor modifications which he presented to the CIO in October 2002, the structure was distributed, modular and hierarchical. A meeting we had in early May challenged all those plans with a myopic centralisation idea which was completely contrary accepted business practice. One comment he made was I had said what Microsoft would do, hey! it is a Microsoft product. Basically, after a rapid torrent of expletives and threats to our jobs amongst other unpalatable statements of subjective analysis, with the fact that he was not listening to anything 3 consultants and the project manager was saying, my marketing literature was out on the job boards.

It was the very last straw.

In the end, a good opportunity came, wherein; I was interviewed for a senior support role and ended up offering advice on how to build up the team. I was offered the job at the interview, there and then.

Playing with irony, I asked for a meeting with my manager on the topic Career Development through his PA who found ample free time for this meeting, he however rescheduled it for the next week, probably because the career development of his staff is off no particular significance - that would make me rather overly cynical.

In the end, I put the letter on his table. For the first time, he had the initiative take from him and his reply was that he was not surprised that I decided to leave and he attributed it specially to points 3 and 4 of my reasons for resignation - how perceptive.

For once, I almost thought I was deliberately frustrated out of the job because of blatant indifference and a lack of candour. See my blog on respect.

Any other boss would say, they are sorry to see their staff go and wonder what could have been done to ameliorate the situation, I suppose, it would take all the man out of my boss to descend to that position of weakness.

He stuff is about slapping people down, superiority by deprecation, not borne out of earned respect, the vision thing or leadership - however, that is just one opinion, mine.

The offer I so clearly made to help my successor through an induction period at not cost was rebuffed as there is enough expertise to take over my role - that is spite, if I ever saw it.

So, whilst I have tendered my resignation, he is yet to get to the point of resignation understanding that I have resigned all because he could not be bothered to be my manager, or maybe I had set too high standards for the my expectation of my manager.

Even I am only human.

The man and his institutions

Developing routine

It has been quite a while since a log has been blogged, herein lies the problem of developing a routine. Whilst a man’s life requires a modicum of routine to help create some stability, the moment any situation turns into routine, the fight begins to introduce change.

Well, that is the story on my existence, change turns into routine which creates the need for another change- the circle, rather than being vicious is a welcome experience of the ability to chart one’s destiny despite the machinations of the petty tyrants who overlord us and thwart every act of self-development.

You will recall my continuous diatribe about change and irrelevance in December/January, well, we are at the point of change that would most certainly maintain relevance for the future.

Great Expectations

A few months ago, one met with a circumstance that clearly indicated one was in a dead-end job. At least that was the view of the boss when we had a meeting about career development.

Unfortunately, much as the boss is a young and very successful political hound, one is at pains to recognise any mentoring acumen towards others apart from himself.

Basically, with the incessant promotions of the boss have come responsibilities that have created a tyrannical tendency to overrule every objective assessment presented for his approval.

That is all at an end for me - I resigned for a better opportunity where people would take advantage of my 15 years experience and expertise, the same experience that was used in considering me for an online Masters degree with the University of Liverpool.

A culmination of mismanaged resources

It is without doubt that one’s departure would be the first of many for the one or many of the following reasons:

• For a long while, the litmus test of any project has been predicated on a political point scoring match between all VPs and if it brought any glory to them - the interest of the company or implementers never features.
• All gratitude and thanks has only ever been passed down from the CIO, never has it come from the manager himself.
• All information being given to the manager in confidence ends up being used as bargaining ammunition no matter how underhand and unscrupulous - this however, is presented as being frank and honest.
• Consultants are employed to provide expert opinions and should be treated as such, in our case, our opinions count for little in relation to what scheme the manager has doggedly decided to adopt irrespective of the logic or commonsense approach needed to aopt new policies - basically, he no more listens.
• There is no managerial oversight for any action taken, creating empires of political megalomaniacs who are always involved in squabbles that undermine the interest of the company, wasting resources on duplicating projects because one team wants ascendancy over the other.
• No one project has been undertaken with a positive pep-talk, rather, the sceptre of our jobs being on the line has been the motivational force bestowed by the boss.
• Career enhancement is stunted by vindictive performance reviews used to air opinions of conduct which have no bearing on performance or review and should have been addressed in other forums. It boils down to a salary increase of about 4% delivered in a letter by Father Christmas, who happens to be your boss.
• The greatest indictment is the lack of mentoring skills, no one person in the team that increased from 9 to about 200 persons has received promotion apart from one who had been promised the job by the manager’s predecessor. Every new opportunity requires a new face, because the boss has not had enough time from feathering his nest to develop management, responsibility and leadership skills in his current staff.
• The job market is looking up and people would only endure this situation for so long before each person’s degree of masochistic endurance is exhausted.

The Man and his Institutions

The Economist featured a letter addressed to the editor comparing psychopaths to sociopaths when deploring the personality of companies.

Whilst for now, one does not have access to the specific words, it goes without saying that the company, organisation, church, establishment or institution comprises of people who create the persona and mien of that group.

The people who have some influence in creating policy or executing policy are the company in varying degrees from the owners, to the board, the management, the middle managers, the departmental supervisors, the team leaders and then the general workforce.

Each subordinate level relies on the level they report to in understanding the essence of the company, its goals, its vision, its mission and its values.

In any case, the people who make up the grouping called an institution [I use institution as a catch all word] sometimes are sacrificed for the survival of the institution. Noble as this might seem, we forget that traditions, cultures, institutions and so on were made for men and not men for those things.

Unfortunately, institution almost always wins in the battle against the self-same people who make up the institution and hence the need for mission statements and voluble policies which appear to give the institution a human face. A face is not enough without a heart - I would develop this in a further blog.

Non, Je ne regrete rien

My old company, for which I should still serve a notice period offered a lot of promise and that is all it offered for my career, development, remuneration, future and gratitude. Even promises have a use by date, cynicism tempts one to confuse promise with lies.

I have done my bit, I can look to my future with a sense of achievement and great expectations - I am on more than speaking terms with my bosses over the last 14 years, I wonder about where it would end with this one.

We probably are both at fault, HR however, is ever so pragmatic about this, if I do not dot my Is or cross my Ts, I have been less than scrupulous.

That said, I am only human, I wish people were just a little more human and less sociopathic, leaving wounded people all the way to your peaks can only have you gravely wounded on your way back, without help, without support and without friends - it is a strange world we live in, but it is still a very beautiful sunny day in Gran Canaria.

Tolerance as a mindset of choice, prejudice and hypocrisy - Part 1

Marriage for all?

One issue that seems to be of particular divisive content in America and many other as it were Western & Christian societies is the wave of homosexual contracts of partnership which presumably are undermining the institution of marriage.

It begs the question; why should marriage suffer irrelevance at the actions of people who cannot even get married without so much opprobrium and vitriolic commentary piled on them by tabloid and shock-jock radio presenters?

One would think that what undermines the institution of marriage itself are the participants in the marriage, issues of trust, abuse, adultery, lust, divorce, re-marriage, abortion and so on - those are the things that have dampened confidence in that institution.

The force of law cannot change human nature from falling prey to things that undermine what they supposedly believe in.

Examples unformed

In fact, I would contend that the participants in marriages have so undermined the significance of that sacrament that everyone sees it as a basic contract of partnership allowing that standard rights of partnership to be shared or transferred. Hence, every partnership seeks to be registered as a marriage.

It is patently unlikely that the newcomers to the established institution of failed marriage vows could further undermine what has already been condemned to sleaze and flagrant hypocrisy.

To contend that marriage is mainly for child-bearing purposes is also very flawed, it can be argued that many marriages do not flourish because the partners did not give time to knowing each other well before the children are born, after which the children have dominated their lives at the expense of the real partnership which is between husband and wife.

There are so many reasons why marriages fail, but rarely has it been because the husband ran off with another man or the wife with another woman. The absurdity of the defence of marriage on those grounds only becomes ever so evident.

What vows mean

Asking a man on the street, one would be amazed at the number who do not know the meaning of a vow, who might perjure and have relatively no insight into the value of integrity. These are the same everyday people who are convenanted to uphold the institution of marriage. One risks cynicism at this point.

The protection of marriage as an institution really should be the understanding of the vows expressed, the gravity of disavowal if there be any penalties and how to suppress selfishness for selfless sharing - at which point celibacy and eunuchry become a more pleasant prospect. Society does not underpine those pillars of successful marriage as it once did.

Marriage of sexualities

Marriage does not have the high standards on integrity, candour and discretion it once had. It is for the participants to change that, with the possibility of them learning that homosexuals might even be better are holding together a relationship of marriage than those who consider it a tenet of life and heterosexual morass.

The arch-divider and leader of the divided world in the White House waded into this issue like a wild rodeo bull set lose in a china shop - constitutional protection of marriage as the union of man and woman. I have no truck with that, but I doubt if the homosexuals were born out of another union.

This Genie ain't gonna be rubbed no more

Rubbing the lamp

When the news broke from the chambers of Judge Hutton that the government had been completely exonerated from the scandal of lying to the public about the 45-minute claim many could be forgiven for thinking that ended the whole issue.

Nay! My friends, Nay! What Tony Blair was cleared of narrowly pertained to the circumstances surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly and nothing about the greater issue of why we went to war.

For one, Mr Blair might as well have been on a treasure hunt two weekends ago and had found the legendary Aladdin's lamp.

The two escapes relating to the tuition fees and Judge Hutton's report were the two stipulated wishes of the genie.

After too many rubs, releases and recaptures, the genie had renegotiated the escape clause of offering just two wishes instead of the usual three.

Methinks the lamp is ready for another rub to produce a lot of smoke but no wish.

Smoking out the facts

Dubbiyew having seen the amazing Houdini of Great Britain rolling lots of BBC heads instead of his and those of his cohorts asked for a rub of the lamp too.

He wants to know the facts about the intelligent or lack of it that was so strenuously argued before congress, before Americans and before the UN in the quest for a coalition of the cajoled who would not be cowed.

Dubbiyew, you cannot handle the truth – one risks quoting Jack Nicholson during a fiery cross-examination by Tom Cruise in A Few Good Men.

If any good men come of out learning the truth from the real facts of why we went to war, they are most probably deserving of a posthumous decoration.

The Awful Truth

The purveyor of a certain programme called The Awful Truth contends that the truth is too awful to contemplate.

The ex-chief of the Iraq Survey Group – David Kay – has unruffled too uncomfortably the feathers of the vested interests that rammed us into the Iraqi quagmire; like quicksand; we are stuck and the more we struggle the more the concrete solidifies well above the torso.

In a last gasp of credulity, symbolising that exclusively close relationship between Great Britain and the United States, Tony Blair and George W. Bush had decided to announce an inquiry into the whole intelligence debacle.

Wishing for a star

Only this time, the wishes have run out; to think they would weather the storm with the same aplomb as the British Houdini came out of last week is as wishful as the caveman who clobbered Beagle 2 as it landed gingerly on Mars. Evidence of life on Mars.

There is no doubt that the intelligence that supported the war persuasion efforts was unreliable, dated, exaggerated and uncorroborated.

Very much, like Andrew Gilligan's claims that lead to the death of Dr Kelly and the Hutton report.

However, if you are not in a position of great authority, you cannot get away with little lies, whilst those in authority can without scruples.

Like the Hutton report, expect surprises but be wary of the accepted truth.