What If Britain Had Not Entered The First World War?

My views on this topic can be found in my e-book ‘In Other Trenches: Alternate Outcomes of the First World War’ It is available for purchase on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Other-Trenches-Alternate-Outcomes-First-ebook/dp/B00ILVJ4C0/ref=sr_1_2?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342569&sr=1-2

UK readers might prefer to access it through:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/In-Other-Trenches-Alternate-Outcomes-ebook/dp/B00ILVJ4C0/ref=sr_1_2?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342371&sr=1-2

Canadian readers can access it through: http://www.amazon.ca/Other-Trenches-Alternate-Outcomes-First-ebook/dp/B00ILVJ4C0/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342669&sr=1-1

Australian readers can access it through: http://www.amazon.com.au/In-Other-Trenches-Alternate-Outcomes-ebook/dp/B00ILVJ4C0/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342833&sr=1-1

What If The Schlieffen Plan Had Succeeded?

My views on this topic can be found in my e-book ‘Down Other Tracks: Alternate Outcomes of the 19th Century’ by Alexander Rooksmoor.  It is available for purchase on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Down-Other-Tracks-Alternate-ebook/dp/B0087QDK88/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1338820140&sr=8-1

UK readers might prefer to access it through: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Down-Other-Tracks-Alternate-ebook/dp/B0087QDK88/ref=sr_1_5?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1338820087&sr=1-5

What If The Spanish Armada Had Been Victorious?

My views on this topic can be found in my e-book ‘Other Exits: REVISED. 'What If?' Outcomes for Tudor and Stuart Monarchs’ by Alexander Rooksmoor. It is available for purchase on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Other-Exits-REVISED-Outcomes-ebook/dp/B00EBUPSL6/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1376051052&sr=1-1&keywords=rooksmoor

UK readers might prefer to access it through:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Other-Exits-REVISED-Outcomes-ebook/dp/B00EBUPSL6/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1376051222&sr=8-5&keywords=Rooksmoor+kindle

Canadian readers might like to access it through: http://www.amazon.ca/Other-Exits-REVISED-Outcomes-ebook/dp/B00EBUPSL6/ref=sr_1_21?ie=UTF8&qid=1376051289&sr=8-21&keywords=Rooksmoor+kindle

 

Property in the UK 5b: The Landlord's Representative Turns Up the Heat

Taking a break from the writing on counter-factuals in this post I return to probably what blogs are supposed to be about, day-to-day life. The ongoing saga of the problems with housing for me and mine continues. To recap, we have rented this house since February. We had to leave the previous one after only 16 months as that landlord split with his wife over Christmas 2006. Now, having been in this new house only 5 months we have been told we have to leave despite our 12-month contract.

The landlord has emigrated to the USA so he has appointed his father as his representative. With interest rates reaching 5.75% this month and set to rise further the £1400 (€2040; US$2800) the landlord pays on his mortgage each month is rising quickly. This man told us lots of lies trying in some way to get us to like him. The key one was that he would not put the property on the market until Monday 2nd July when he returned from the USA himself. In fact he put it on the market immediately, Monday 18th June. I was angered by his lie and my housemate who works from home would not accept people coming to view the house and disrupting her life. As she pointed out, in the contract it says we only have to permit this in the final month of our tenancy, i.e. January 2008. She certainly wanted to negotiate some kind of deal so we did not have people turning up at any time with the estate agent simply letting themselves in without warning. Of course to the landlord's representative this house is simply a business and we are an illegal obstacle to his plans whereas to us it is our home and we feel violated to be treated this way.

The landlord's representative has a major problem, his mind is in a fantasy world in which he owns 47 properties and used to be a lawyer and is somehow a nice man. Even the estate agents are irritated by his attitude. He clearly expected the house to be sold by the time he returned from the USA and us to have disappeared from his concerns. Even if we had been willing to leave without complaint, in my experience it takes a minimum of 4-5 weeks to move to a new property (you have to find a place, sign contracts with the new landlord, get credit checks, get a day when removal people can come, get a day off work, etc., etc.) but of course the landlord's representative sees this as none of his concern, we should simply have gone.

Right, so the landlord's representative's fantasy world where tenants disappear in a puff of smoke when they are no longer needed (we pay £1000 (€1460; US$2000) for this house, so have provided the landlord a good income) has run up against the real world. What is his reponse? To call my mobile 'phone eight times in two hours; to ring my housemate at 08.00 when she is trying to leave the house to take her son to school; to park his car outside our home and watch us go about our business. We want to negotiate with him, but he will provide not telephone numbers or contact details and will not keep the letting agent informed. Ourselves and even now people coming to the house, look up and down the street, uneasy to think he is watching them. He will not listen to what we are saying, that we need time to move, we need a reduction in rent or a lump sum to recompense us for being turfed out early and having our lives disrupted by people tramping round our home. He says we are breaking the law, that we have not kept up the house and garden properly (it has rained incessantly for three weeks in the UK, weedkiller is ineffective in such weather and they left the driveway not properly surfaced so weeds keep getting through) and that we have been late with our rent each month. We were tricked one month. My salary comes on different days each month sometimes as early as the 27th sometimes as late as the 31st so paying out on the 28th each month was sometimes hard. We were told that if we paid an additional £100 we could move it to the 1st of each month. We did exactly in line with what we were told and then were told we were late and should pay a £25 per day fine. We have gone back to the 28th but have lost the £100 and the landlord's representative has said we have been late every month, which is a lie, but the landlord's representative's fantasy world can only see as trying to cheat him at every turn, when in fact the landlord has tricked us out of an additional £100. A letter from the lawyer of the landlord has been promised outlining all that we have done wrong in the house and what legal steps are going to be taken against us.

The landlord's representative keeps talking at us and has never listened to what we have said. We are treated as if we have no rights and are even illegal in asking questions. He has said things blatantly like 'I will find a loophole to get you out'; 'I will do what I have to do', that latter one verging on sounding like a threat of violence. Even if we had rolled over to his demands immediately, he would have been dissatisfied as we could never have moved on in 2 weeks as he wants. We now feel under siege with him parked up outside the house and ringing at all times. My housemate has been made ill by the worry of all of this. She has an appointment on Monday on neutral ground with the letting agent as mediator, but given the landlord's representative's fantasies I fear her words will fall on deaf ears. The man is stupid because if he had not lied to us, and had listened to us, he could have avoided all this hassle and cost of lawyers, but clearly he loves to throw his weight around.

For us, the sense of powerlessness that I have been talking about for the last two months is again re-emphasised. We are a well-off household, with intelligence and good networks. If we still suffer such bullying, heaven help people in similar circumstances who are not blessed with these things.

I have just realised the date is 07/07/07, well I hope someone out there has had some luck today, if you have done, have one on me.

What If Germany/the Nazis/Hitler had Won the Second World War/World War Two?

My views on this topic can be found in my e-book ‘Other Roads: Alternate Outcomes of the Second World War’ It is available for purchase on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Other-Roads-Alternate-Outcomes-Second-ebook/dp/B00J44F2L0/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342550&sr=1-1

UK readers might prefer to access it through:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Other-Roads-Alternate-Outcomes-Second-ebook/dp/B00J44F2L0/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342343&sr=1-1

Canadian readers can access it through: http://www.amazon.ca/Other-Roads-Alternate-Outcomes-Second-ebook/dp/B00J44F2L0/ref=sr_1_25?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342737&sr=1-25

Australian readers can access it through: http://www.amazon.com.au/Other-Roads-Alternate-Outcomes-Second-ebook/dp/B00J44F2L0/ref=sr_1_25?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1395342887&sr=1-25

Brown's Golden Age?

Well, as regular readers of this blog will know, I have been waiting for the departure of Tony Blair from politics since 1994. His smug, authoritarian attitudes have made politics very unpleasant. I note that commentators from the right, notably Dan Atkinson and Larry Elliott's New Right volume, 'Fantasy Island' and from the left, are now savaging him without restraint. I may not subscribe to either view, but add my condemnation to the pile. The arrogance of the man to leave being an MP to become an envoy to a region where he has caused so many deaths is stunning even for Blair. As someone said of an IT manager at my company, 'he's a man who knows he's God'.

I was angered by David Cameron saying that the change of prime minister needs an election. He seems to forget that of the six times the prime minister has changed mid-term of parliament (1916 Liberals Asquith to Lloyd George; 1940 Conservatives Chamberlain to Churchill (though effectively a new coalition was formed); 1955 Conservatives Churchill to Eden; 1957 Eden to Macmillan; 1976 Labour Wilson to Callaghan; 1990 Conservatives Thatcher to Major) four of these have been Conservative premiers. If such a rule like that existed, heaven help us, we would have probably had both Thatcher and Blair, so alike in many ways, clinging on for another 2 years or so.

Right, that is enough pixels wasted on Blair. Let's turn to Gordon Brown. As you know, I am interested in 'what if?' history and it is curious to think what would have happened if rather than Brown backing Blair as leader of the Labour Party, the situation had been reversed and we would now see Brown stepping down after 10 years in office and Blair coming to the fore. I guess, Brown, unmarried and without children at the time of the 1997 election was seen as unsuitable in the family obsessed British society. He has picked up both along the way and all the better for him, no doubt. However, I hate to think we could never have a single or a gay prime minister in the future and that Blair has scorched the family requirements on the post.

Now, there is a lot of expectation of Brown. Like Blair he has a religious side, but it seems more restrained and he seems more able to separate state and religion in the way it should be in a modern society. For some Old Labourites, who have been clinging on through the years of a Blair party (see my earlier posting about how we have not had the Labour Party in power 1997-2007) see some hope in Brown. He might be the heir of John Smith (Labour leader 1992-4, held a similar position to Neil Kinnock as Labour leader as Brown did to Blair and was also Scottish and like Brown, looked like he could have been a bank manager), he might be the heir of more in the Labour Party's history. I doubt in 2017 I will be sitting here bemoaning the Brownite Party.

What is interesting is the clean sweep (almost) of ministers from the Blair Cabinet. Harriet Harman, the winner of the deputy leadership of the Labour Party has only become Leader of the House of Commons, there is no deputy prime minister to replace Prescott; there does not need to be. Partly that indicates the breadth of Brown's support across the party that he does not need someone from one side of it to be his deputy. I am glad to see Peter Hain and Hilary Benn (Environment) in the Cabinet, but there are some odd compilation roles, nothing of the Churchill 'overlord' or Edward Heath's 'super-ministries', more maybe reminiscent of the Department of the Enviroment, Regions and Transport that Prescott had under Blair. Hain gets Wales (though he was originally South African), Work and Pensions and Innovation, Universities & Skills (John Denham) and Defence & Scotland (Des Browne - at least he is Scottish). The Miliband brothers, (David as Foreign Secretary and Ed as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster) both being in the Cabinet seems somewhere between Victorian Cabinets with family members in them and the Kennedys. Alistair Darling as Chancellor of the Exchequer, from the days when he was Chief Secretary to the Treasury he seems to have been in waiting for the top Treasury post almost as long as Brown was for the leadership. Now we have a Home Office, shorn of its prison role which goes to the new Ministry of Justice under the pretty draconian Jack Straw, it has been felt safe to leave it to a woman, Jacqui Smith and I welcome that change; she of all the newcomers has been put immediately to the test by the terrorist attacks this week (assuming they were not staged by MI5 to emphasise to Brown that he must listen to them).

The one thing that does seem to have been overlooked is Brown effectively ending the SDP's history. He has used a 19th century phrase, 'Cabinet of All Talents' and brought in Lord Lester and Lady Williams, both former members of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) which was the right-wing of the Labour Party which broke away in 1983 arguing that Labour, in the face of the Thatcher government was becoming too left-wing. It worked in the so-called Alliance with the Liberals until 1988 when the parties merged to form the Liberal Democrat Party which we have today. Some see Brown, with his appeal to actual Liberal Democrats like Lord Ashdown (who would not join the government) and Lady Neuberger (who has joined) as seeking to locate Labour in the centre of politics. However, what people forget is that the Liberal Democrats are actually to the left of the current Labour Party, certainly the Blair Party. In addition Shirley Williams and Anthony Lester respectively were part of and advised the Labour government of 1974-9, so actually despite their sojourn into the SDP which was more anti-Thatcherite than Blair, are links to Labour's past. So as not to scare the business and financial sectors, that have been pretty good to Brown he has former head of the Confederation of British Industry, Digby Jones and has set up a Department of Business & Enterprise under John Hutton. Whilst it may appear that Brown is throwing open his arms wide, interestingly, his large tent has people that you would associate with traditional Labour values. Labour was never anti-capitalist, it sought until Blair got rid of Clause 4 in 1994, supported a mixed economy, which we re-nationalisation of parts of the railway system we may be moving back to. It liked to work with enlightened business people. Brown has cleverly 'spun' Old Labour again, and repackaged its traditional views for the 21st century at a time when they are probably most needed in the face of exploitative multi-nationals and the migration of jobs and the suppression of rights and welfare.

I am too cynical to really expect much from Brown. At best we have a prime minister whose manner I can stomach a little more easily. I would love to be surprised and to have the true revolution that 1997 so falsely promised. However, ten years from now, I suspect I will be bemoaning Brown's support of US foreign policy in invading some country and his inability to rein in avaricious utility companies, much as I would have done with Blair.

Computer: Let Me Be!

One irritant that I have not yet tackled is the hassle with computers which seem to think they know what I want better than I do myself. They are not my servant, rather they are like an annoying salesman camped out on my doorstep, who, whenever I happen to open my front door or even look out of my window bombard me with the latest products. Even in my house, they keep changing the channel on my TV and the decor on my walls, with the arrogant attitude that they know better.

Stopping with the analogy. Every time I switch on a computer, and on average, due to my work, I use three different machines in the average week, I have to wait for all the updates from the various companies to load in, plus the ones my own company feels I need. This means it can be 2-3 minutes before I can even start work. I cannot believe that there is that much new stuff every week that they have to take over my machine to load it in. Of course if I was not firewalled then there would be all the spam and the spyware and the adware and so on. In order of priority for access to my machine, I come last. As if this was not enough, when I come to close it down I have to wait sometimes fifteen minutes for it to do all the uploads. With a PC I walk away but with a laptop I have to keep it internet connected otherwise there will be twice as much stuff to wade through. If I happen not to use a computer for a couple of weeks, then it is 30 minutes plus. Why? Surely it is inefficient if each day I am losing 15 minutes' work watching a bar move across the screen.

On my home PC somehow I got an Adobe photo album tester. I have no idea how, but now I cannot rid my machine of it. Every time I log on it asks me if I want to buy it, I say no, but it still proceeds trying to search out photos on my machine and telling me my digital camera battery is low (I do not even have a digital camera) and so on. It tries again later too. For me, no means no, why can it not understand. My house mate's son who is almost 6 and can read a little, gets bewildered when midway through a game of 'Shrek' or 'Finding Nemo' the machine starts binging at him and sending up pop-ups even when he is logged in as his own identity. What is the point of asking him if he wants to upgrade the DVD player, he cannot even understand the words?

It does not stop when you are not even connected to the internet, software is just as bad. I write a lot, and yet even when I have corrected the spelling and grammar checker from US to UK spelling it still keeps interfering, putting in bullet points when I do not need them, telling me effectively that 'which' is not a proper word and you just try typing 'fora' as in the plural of 'forum' (for those of us who use proper plurals)! If I try to write a letter, it says do I need help - no I have been writing letters longer than even Microsoft has been in existence! It tries to put 'yours truly' at the end of the letter, even though in the UK that is a sarcastic phrase and 'yours faithfully' or 'yours sincerely' which it never offers me, are the correct ones. Every machine I have go through disabling all of these interruptions.

I understand that people often need help, but as in the classroom you should be able to ask for it when you need it. I hate my computer patronising me and trying to force words and a culture on me which I do not want. A computer should be about granting you freedom to compose and to explore as you choose, but instead we are driven to behave identically to each other, and coming from a non-US culture, in a way which jars with what I know and is correct for my 'locale'. Give me a computer that treats me like an adult.