The Guardian (or is that theguardian?) has a good take on the petrol protests:

Motorists will be hurt by price increases which will leave them less to spend on other things, but not yet by shortages which are largely self-generated. At the whiff of a rumour of shortages motorists queue at the nearest cut-price station, often ignoring a slightly more expensive one down the road and unaware that idling in a petrol station costs 2p to 3p a minute.

If motorists want to save energy and money then, on AA Trust figures, merely driving at the legal limit of 70mph instead of 80mph would save 40p every 10 miles. As the Petrol Retailers’ Association points out, if the government introduced a minimum purchase of £20, the rush to fill up because of a shortage that only arises out of panic buying would disappear. But that sounds too much like joined-up thinking.

You can browse the new Guardian here for free. I have a hard copy (as I usually do), and I have to say that I really quite like it. Possibly more than Andrew Brown did. But I do miss Doonesbury…

If this isn’t a bizarre move, Mr Brown has been pleading with oil producing companies to up their production, so that petrol prices don’t hit £1/litre. Why he needs to do this pleading when two-thirds of the petrol price goes to him, I don’t really understand. For every penny more the suppliers charge, the price goes up a total of 3p, thanks to 2p in tax. So if Mr Brown is so desperate for the petrol prices not to rise, then why can he not reduce the proportion of tax charged, so that the total revenue remains consistent instead of increasing? That way, the impact of any increase would be reduced by two-thirds. Heck, he could even reduce the total revenue if he’s so worried about petrol prices.

I guess we can only be glad that

his comments did little to placate fuel protesters, who said demonstrations planned for Wednesday would go ahead unless Government ministers agreed to meet them to discuss their concerns within the next two days

As much as the last petrol protest was inconvenient, it certainly succeeded. And it could well do so again.

Of course, the bigger political picture is that this problem belongs to Mr Brown rather than Mr Blair – and it’s not good for a leader-in-waiting to be seen in a bad light… Could Mr Blair use this crisis to his advantage, and prevent (or at least make more difficult) the passing of the mantle to Mr Brown? I doubt it, but it’s certainly a possibility.

There’s a preview of the new Guardian online here… It’s well worth a look, if only to marvel at their new-found obsession with blue, which seems almost as extensive as that on this site! It’s certainly looking quite good…

Two paramedics from California have recorded their horrifying experience of the mismanagement of Hurricane Katrina here (via).

As we entered the center of the City, we finally encountered the National Guard. The Guards told us we would not be allowed into the Superdome as the City’s primary shelter had descended into a humanitarian and health hellhole. The guards further told us that the City’s only other shelter, the Convention Center, was also descending into chaos and squalor and that the police were not allowing anyone else in. Quite naturally, we asked, “If we can’t go to the only 2 shelters in the City, what was our alternative?” The guards told us that that was our problem

Just as dusk set in, a Gretna Sheriff showed up, jumped out of his patrol vehicle, aimed his gun at our faces, screaming, “Get off the fucking freeway”. A helicopter arrived and used the wind from its blades to blow away our flimsy structures. As we retreated, the sheriff loaded up his truck with our food and water.

If you don’t read anything else about Katrina, read this. And then you’ll probably need to see this, for a little light relief.

It’s the kind of story you really couldn’t make up. Parody has merged with reality, as Stella McCartney and Pamela Anderson unite to help the domestic pets affected by Hurricane Katrina.

Thousands are dead, and hundreds of thousands of thousands are homeless in what’s been described as the USA’s greatest ever disaster. Billions of pounds of damage has been caused, the area is in chaos with looting and shootings seemingly common. People have lost their entire life’s possessions, and all the memories associated with them. Even Michael Jackson‘s getting stuck in to the humanitarian aid effort. And two slightly ditsy blondes want to help the cats, dogs, and guinea pigs of the region.

I’m sure they’ll be grateful.

The Times, amongst others, has run with the story today that the government is to give failing schools just one year to improve, or else close them. I don’t really understand how this is supposed to work… After all, with the very real threat of closure hanging over a school, it will be unable to attract better staff and more able pupils, who would presumably want a more secure future. So surely by threatening the school, the situation only gets worse… Besides which, the worst schools are generally the over-subscribed inner-city comprehensives – so this will only further cut school places, of which the government says we don’t have enough. It seems counterintuitive to say the least!

It’s one of those strange Labour ideas, like fining NHS hospitals which don’t come up to scratch, so that the hospital then has even less money with which to hire more staff and generally improve things, and hence has to cut even more corners, and things get worse. I don’t understand that logical in that either…

Maybe I’m just slow…

Despite it being over a week now since Katrina struck, I haven’t posted anything much about it. Clearly, a great number of lives have been lost, and this is doubtlessly a tragedy. But all of that is obvious, and there isn’t really a great deal more to say at the moment (not that that usually stops me…). President Bush’s gross mishandling of the incident certinaly can’t be politically (or practically) helpful, and the international help required to handle the incident might make the US reconsider its foreign policy – and maybe even its climate change policy. As always, the Beeb has comprehensive coverage, as does the Grauny, and, of course, the IHT.

I thought this photostory from silicon.com was fairly interesting, even if the Amazon.co.uk warehouse isn’t quite at fascinating as Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. In fact, it seems pretty dull. But it’s good to know that behind the veneer of a highly technological company, this is still a pretty simple operation, with guys wandering round picking books off shelves.

Some ill-defined ‘experts’ have put their thinking caps on and come up with the hypothesis that dyslexia

does not exist and is no more than an emotional construct

Their full arguments will be put forward in a Channel 4 documentary next week, but there’s an outline of them in today’s Guardian. Now it’s clearly foolish to comment on their theories before hearing them in full, but heck, I’m going to do so anyway.

I am by no means an expert in dyslexia, and I have very little experience with it. So frankly, I’m quite probably spouting ill-informed rubbish. Nothing new there then. But… I don’t think dyslexia is a myth. I think it’s a genuine disorder which requires special treatment for those who suffer from it. I think there’s a wealth of neurological and genetic evidence to suggest that such a condition exists, and to say it is merely a myth doesn’t seem helpful or sensible. However, I think it’s chronically over-diagnosed, and not nearly so widespread as it appears to be. As the producer puts it:

Dyslexia persists as a construct largely because it serves an emotional, not scientific, function. Forget about letter reversals, clumsiness, inconsistent hand preference and poor memory – these are commonly found in people without reading difficulties, and in poor readers not considered to be dyslexic …

Public perceptions often link reading difficulties with intelligence and, in our culture, an attribution of low intelligence often results in feelings of shame and humiliation.

It is hardly surprising, therefore, that the widespread, yet wholly erroneous, belief that dyslexics are intellectually bright but poor readers would create a strong, sometimes impassioned demand to be accorded a dyslexic label.

Yes of course, some children will require special resources and dispensations, but we certainly don’t need spurious diagnoses of dyslexia to achieve such ends.

According to dyslexia teaching from CPD Bytes, the diagnosis of dyslexia essentially creates an excuse for poor reading, and can be used to garner extra support – both educational and emotional – for the child. For any child who is having difficulty at school, this diagnosis can provide the extra help they need, and so be seen as a very positive thing. It is also practically impossible to obtain an educational statement of needs – as well as the appropriate funding for the school – without some kind of medical diagnosis, and dyslexia provides the perfect solution. The statementing process largely fails to recognise that some pupils need individual support not because of a medical problem, but just because of a generalised learning difficulty – and without a statement, there’s no money, and so no additional support, which means the child’s performance is below par and hence the school’s league table position slips.

There is, therefore, a practical incentive for the child to be diagnosed, and a financial incentive for the school which is conducted the testing to make the diagnosis. In such circumstances, it would be a minor miracle if only those with the condition were labelled as having it.

Of course, all of this does not mean that those incorrectly diagnosed with dyslexia are not genuinely struggling, and do not require extra help. But surely the over-diagnosis can only have a negative impact for the help given to those with dyslexia, as the evidential base for the help given becomes muddied by successes garnered from those without the condition.

As far as I can see, what’s needed here is a greater recognition of generalised learning difficulties, so that each child can get the support they truly need without having to be wrongly burdened with a medical label for the rest of their life.