Letter to the I: Women in Afghanistan

I would like to thank Kim Sengupta for his thoughtful article "West Must Not Fail Women on Afghanistan again".  His reference to the anti-war left's opposition to our involvement puts them with interesting company.  The UKIP right wing and the American Alternative Right under Steve Bannon are also against Western involvement in Afghanistan.  But as Mr Sengupta wisely pointed out, there are consequences to inaction as well as action when it comes to our footprint abroad.  The US and the UK leaving Afghanistan to burn will just make Afghans mistrust the West even more.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: British Monarchy PR letter

With regards to Emilie Lamplough's letter, I believe she takes the British Monarchy's PR moves too much at face value.  The British Royal Family need to constantly emphasise how relatable they are to our lives to ensure the very survival of their institution.  If they didn't do this we the public would be left to wonder how such an arcane institution is still relevant to our lives.  Queen Victoria was hardly down-to-earth, since she had a scornful attitude to women's rights and immodestly took the title of Empress of India.  She only took this title because her daughter was made Empress of Germany.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Troops in Afghanistan

With regards to Valerie Crews' letter I beg to differ with her on our involvement in Afghanistan.  Very simply; we broke it, we bought it.  It is unfair on the Afghans to give them a chance of freedom only to snatch it away. For the first time women are going to university.  For the first time their culture is starting to flourish away from Taliban censorship.  It is disingenuous to say that we want our troops to leave because of current Afghan civilian casualties.  If the Taliban takeover the country again there will be plenty more of them.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Bill Clinton Letter

With regards to Timothy Stroud's letter, I believe the Clintons are unfairly blamed for US President Donald Trump's election.  Former US President Bill Clinton's important achievements are too quickly dismissed because of the indiscretions of his private life.  Bill Clinton's terms had the highest levels of sustained post-war economic growth, with a healthy budget surplus as a bonus.  Clinton also managed to pass an Assault Weapons Ban.  His timely humanitarian intervention in Kosovo also saved many lives.  Trump won much the same way as the Trump Organisation won success.  This is by making promises that are too good to be true, then using deception to get out of delivering on them.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Democracy Letter

With regard to Kenneth R. Jarrett's letter, I believe he is wrong to lay the blame for the rise of UKIP and the Far Right on the "political class".  The hard truth is that we hold up the political class with our votes and all too often our apathy.  Voter apathy and unwillingness on the public's part to stand for election where veteran politicians have failed is what has caused our democracy to "wither on the vine".  We cannot teach our children to take responsibility for their actions if we do not do the same.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Trump Letter

With regard to David Mazza's letter he is unfairly allowing Donald Trump to operate by double standards.  When terrorist attacks were perpetrated by Islamist extremists during the Obama Administration, he publicly called on Obama to resign unless he cited specifically "Radical Islamists" as responsible.  I agree with Mazza that extremist violence is unacceptable whichever source it comes from, but that is not the issue.  The issue is that Trump's earlier comments were a shameless attempt at identity politics to rally those who dislike anything remotely connected to Islam.  His recent comments were likely tactically shaped since many of his supporters have much in common with the terrorist in this attack.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Corbyn and Venezuela

With regards to Steven McNamara's letter, he seems to be deflecting the issue of Venezuela to give cover to Corbyn.  Instead of addressing the issue over whether Corbyn was wrong to support Venezuela's Government, he randomly changed the subject to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict.  As a man of principle who once claimed that it is everyone's right to fight oppression, surely Corbyn should be supporting the protestors against the government?  If Corbyn and his supporters want to embody the New Politics of honesty, I don't think reverting to the Old Politics way of avoiding answers to difficult and embarrassing questions is credible.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: North Korea Letter

I very much doubt that US President Donald Trump's recent blood curdling threats to North Korea will do much to change their position.  China's support is mainly responsible for allowing North Korea to whether successive sanctions.  They support North Korea because they fear a collapse of the country will result in an occupation by American troops.  If Trump was shrewd he would publicly disavow any such occupation, perhaps in the form of a written treaty with the Chinese.  The grim reality is that a Chinese annexation of North Korea may have less of a risk of nuclear escalation than a US attack on the country.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Trump Letter

I am becoming more and more convinced that the seemingly chaotic way that President Donald Trump runs the White House is by design and not by accident.  Every time a major resignation or sacking takes place the news cycle goes into a frenzy over the recently departed official.  This conveniently blanks out coverage of the disturbing testimony starting to come out of Congress's probe into the Russian scandal.  His supporters are likely to put up with this style of ruling for a while, since it fits into his narrative of governing unlike any other President.  I feel their support will only waver if the US economy faces a severe downturn.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Green Taxis

With regards to David Gant's letter regarding Taxis, I believe he is being a bit unfair to Taxi drivers.  Many Taxi drivers are self employed and are thus vulnerable to extra costs.  In my home city the council has unfairly burdened them with the cost of painting their Taxis blue, in a scheme to lessen the use of unlicensed Taxis.  Forcing Taxi drivers to buy an electric car would be a hefty cost on them.  Governments could be the vehicle for easing such transitions, by instance offering loan schemes to buy such vehicles.  To make our economy competitive and green we need to support self employed people during the technological transition.

Regards

Zachary Barker

Letter to the I: Royals and the Military

I applaud Jane Jakeman's letter denouncing Prince Charles ' shameless posing with military medals he has not earned.  I would point out though that the British Royal Family making a mockery of our armed forces has been going on from at least when the Duke of York mishandled his command during the Napoleonic Wars.  Prince Harry and William have pirouetted from one military service to another, at great cost to the taxpayer.  The former had much more protection from enemy fire more than his fellow squad mates.  The Americans would go mad if the Trump's treated their armed forces so flippantly, so why do we allow our Royal Family to do so.

Regards

Zachary Barker 

Letter to the I: Queen's Retirement

With regards to Nicholas Winch's letter which recommends the Queen retirement, with respect to him I think he misunderstands her motives in persevering.  I am convinced that the Queen means to follow the tradition of the other allegedly "great" Queen that was Queen Victoria and die in office.  In so doing the mourning period will neatly cover the transition period to the successor, which will most likely be the more controversial Prince Charles.  The British public are well within their rights to see past this cynical PR manoeuvre and consider democratic alternatives to an institution that is much more frail than our aging monarch.

Regards

Zachary Barker