Today is Remembrance Day.

It is a 'jour ferie' in France - all the shops closed etc, the nearest France gets to a bank holiday. 

But I read something a few days that shocked me somewhat - that there are only three British veterans left of this war.

Three, count them. Aged between 108 and 116 years of age, frankly it is a wonder there are any at all. They will all be attending the ceremony today, and next year, who knows if there will be?

When I was a child, the old men marching proudly down Whitehall each November 11 were First World War veterans, and the Second World War veterans - my parents among them - were still quite hale and hearty. But for today's children, those old men and women are my parent's generation - what is left of them - and the others are almost gone.

I suddenly realise that what for me was the present, the personal experience of my family, is rapidly becoming history. It's a strange thought, because everyone thinks of themselves as living in the present, not the past. My grandfather missed the war by only months, but as an inhabitant of Oldham in Lancashire, well remembered the local Pals regiment marching away to war, many of them never to return, so in our family, talk of the Great War was of something experienced and remembered, not something one read about or filtered through the medium of books or television. 

I am pleased to see that there is a resurgence of interest in the First World War, due to the upsurge in interest in genealogy. The most awful of events, a devastating war of attrition (which means, in Greek, to 'rub away'), it deserves to be remembered forever as an example of the total stupidity of which humanity is capable. Fresh into a new century that might have heralded prosperity, technological advancement and better living conditions for all, instead European humanity used its new advances to immolate itself.

It was the first time there was a general draft of the male population of the major European countries, with civilians executed if they deserted and conscientious objectors imprisoned if they refused to murder their fellow human beings. The first time men had killed each other from the air, only a decade after the skies had been conquered. The first time they killed each other from under the sea, only a few years after submarination had been achieved. The first time civilian populations were deliberately targeted in order to induce terror and capitulation. The first time chemical warfare was used on a grand scale, leaving thousands dead, blind and with breathing problems forever. And it introduced a new phenomenon - the soldier 'missing presumed killed', a euphemism for blown to smithereens by high explosives, no body left to bury, no remains left to mourn. 

The War To End All Wars. What a start to the bloodiest century in history. France, where I live, has never recovered from the First World War. So many men of marriageable age were lost here that the population has struggled ever since to replace itself. Throughout Europe over 20 million lives were lost.

The reasons for getting into the war in the first place bear some watching and the sheer incompetence of the generals beggars belief. It would lead to near-revolution in the trenches and a seething resentment of the class system at home that would culminate in the General Strike of 1926, but sadly never a full revolution - which is something Britain could certainly do with.

Douglas Haig, the British commander, believed until his death in 1928 that machine guns were no match for horses, despite all the evidence to the contrary. He also believed that British troops should march from the trenches in slow formation, the better to achieve control - whereupon they were, of course, mercilessly cut down by German machine guns like wheat in the field. Alan Clarke's masterly The Donkeys is a good introduction to the subject, if you haven't read it. And the memoirs such as 'Goodbye to all that' and 'Memoirs of a foxhunting man' are also essential reading for anyone interested in this war and how terribly it affected the people who fought it.

If possible, of course, the peace was more mishandled than the war itself by the nasty, vindictive old men who started it, leading directly to the advent of Nazism and another war, just 20 years later, that would end in the deaths of around 60 million people.

I hope that today, as people remember the Great War, and pay their respects to the few survivors that remain, that they also remember to be angry. Angry for the pointlessness of it all, angry for the way the populaces of Europe were betrayed and manipulated by their leaders, and angry for the way that a whole generation of hope and promise - our grandfathers and great-grandfathers - was left by their leaders to rot in the mud of Flanders. 

Almost lost in the news of Obama's victory, there was both good and bad news for women in several states in the US.

The good news is that in Colorado and South Dakota, voters rejected ballot measures that would have restricted access to abortion. 

In Colorado, the ballot, which would have led to a recognition of fertilised eggs, even those outside a womb, as 'persons' - thus probably ending any possibility of in vitro fertilisation for infertile couples - was rejected by a whopping 74 per cent of voters.

In South Dakota, the ballot would have restricted abortion to victims of rape or incest, or women whose health was in danger, and any doctors performing abortions outside of those circumstances would have faced jail or fines. This too was rejected.

Sadly, rights for gay couples were lost in California, Arizona, Florida and Arkansas. 

California's Proposition 8, which sought to eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry, was passed by 52 per cent, thus invalidating all the recent gay marriages that have taken place - a huge blow for hundreds of people.

The Arizona measure, Proposition 102, redefined marriage as 'between one man and one woman', therefore denying gay marriage rights in that state (passed by 56 per cent), while a bigger victory for the right came in Florida, where Proposition 2, also redefining marriage as a union between one man and one women, passed by 63 per cent.

In Arkansas, came the worst results of all, as gay and lesbian couples, whose marriages cannot be legally recognised in that state, came under a blanket ban on 'unmarried couples' adopting or providing foster care for children. This passed with 57 percent voter approval, a sad defeat for many committed couples who want to raise children, and for the many children who need caring and stable home environments.

So, a grim day for gay rights in the US, but hopefully there will be a fight back and legal challenges to all the rulings will ensue.

It's a strange business when you think about it.

We Europeans can't vote in a US election, but we watch with baited and sometimes frustrated breath because everything the US does affects the rest of us. It's a relief to have it all done and dusted.

A historic event, as everyone says. Although Obama is about as white a black guy as you could ever come across, and although I would have preferred Hillary, it is probably more important for America that they get their first black president than that they get their first woman president. Women have always been discriminated against, but only when they were black were they slaves. 

I didn't manage to stay up all night to watch. When I calculated that it would be 5.00am before the first results came in, I sloped off to bed at 1.30, then got up again at 7.00 to find a complete landslide.  It is impossible even for an old cynic like me not to be moved at others' emotion at the result, and it's fantastic to see so many people actually involved in the election process, no matter which way they voted. 

Personally I would have liked to see more substance to the Obama campaign - more meat on the bones of what he stands for - so it now a case of sitting back and waiting to see what will happen. At least a Democratic Congress might help matters along and the US might, for the first time in 40 years, see some real social reform if all goes well, though I think the health insurers have the country so firmly by the balls that improvement in that area would be very difficult. 

And how will Bush be remembered, I wonder? To the European mind, Americans have a habit of electing dumb fuckers as President (I well remember the howls of anguish when Reagan got in), but Bush has got to be the worst of the lot. Incoherent, stumbling, full of malapropisms - a clown who tapdanced on the White House steps - he had me reaching for the 'mute' button every time he appeared on television. I found him unbearable.

In terms of his policies, he was a disaster for his country and his people. Under the Bush administration, let us remember, the rich have got richer and EVERYONE ELSE in America has got poorer or stagnated. This is not a good legacy. NOT signing the Kyoto Protocol is not a good legacy. Iraq, Guantanamo Bay with its torture chambers, extraordinary rendition, the Patriot Act, the attitude to North Korea, Cuba, Iran, are not good legacies. The endless faith-based initiatives, the brakes put on science and stem cell research, Terry Schiavo, the resistance to equal rights for gay people, the worst financial cataclysm in a century, are not good legacies.

It remains to be seen how much Obama can regain America's respect on the world stage - there is a great deal of damage to repair - but at least it's a step in the right direction. And it will be a relief to not have to reach for the remote whenever the President appears on the television.

Well, one could hardly let the US election go by without a mention. Tonight's the night (at least on French time).

I've steered clear on this blog of that silly bitch Sarah Palin, by and large, because to tell the truth, it depresses me to even think that she exists, with her nauseating winking and 'oh lawdy shucks' wittering about small-town America. Thank God for Tina Fey, who should be given a medal.

Equally depressing is Republican voters accusing Obama of 'socialism', as if any of them knew what socialism even was, or how it differs from Communism. These people are so unbelievably dumb that they shouldn't be allowed to vote at all. Truth is, a good dose of socialism would benefit most Americans, who don't even have a proper health service or welfare system - 60 years after these were established in the UK. 

The misunderstanding of Obama aside, who is no more a socialist than he is a Muslim, I still hope that he wins, even if - as every US politician - he is way to the right of European sensibilities. Even if he were not backed by the insidious Karl Rove, McCain is too old. And I don't mean his age in years - I mean his level of fitness and energy, his attitude to technology (doesn't even 'do' email), the way he stumbles and fumbles over his words. One might respect him the way you respect a beloved elderly relative, but you don't put them in charge of anything important. He is past his sell-by date.

Obama in contrast is still young and energetic, screamingly intelligent, articulate and - one hopes - committed to everything he says he believes in. Personally, I would have preferred to see Hillary win - her kind of experience is valued, not denigrated in Europe - but failing the advent of the first woman president of the US, I will be more than happy to see the first black president instead. 

I must admit, it took me a while to notice that Obama was black. I didn't notice Lewis Hamilton was black either, till someone mentioned it (I'd noticed he was beautiful, of course - I'm not blind). Like what gender someone is, I find skin colour irrelevant, and having lived in an area in London where most people were black, Asian or Oriental, it seems un-noteworthy. My sister, however, is scared to death that someone's going to kill Obama simply because he's black, and I hope that she's not right. 

The race issue all seems very strange to a Brit, because although we're not immune to racism - we have our fair share of green-teethed fuckheads too - we have never had institutionalised racism of the kind that bedevilled America. Whites-only drinking fountains, or whites-only schools, blacks at the back of the bus and that kind of thing. Individuals may be racist, but the state is meant to regard everyone as equal. In fact, the US Army warned its servicemen in the Second World War not to be shocked at the British treating black servicemen as equals. Cringe-making, is it not?

Anyway, that's it for today's blog, as I need to get on with work, then the DH and I will be crawling off to bed in the early evening, as the election results won't start to come in until 11.00pm our time, and won't finish till 6.00am. Four years ago, we stayed up the whole night, at first in elation and then in increasing levels of despair and anger at the utter stupidity of the US electorate (electing that moron once, we could excuse, as the 2000 election was clearly fraudulent, but the second time, after Iraq, after Guantanamo, there was really no excuse...).

But let's hope tonight for a landslide, fewer people deprived of their rightful vote, young people who are willing to take part in the democratic process, and that Obama will be president elect before we pass out with exhaustion. 

Well, Josef Fritzl just gets nicer and nicer, doesn't he?

On top of having incarcerated his daughter and raped her for most of her life, it now appears that he also bricked up his mother in a windowless attic for as much as 20 years. Mummy upstairs, daughter in the cellar and family life going on the floors inbetween. Really, it beggars belief. 

It was all her fault, of course, not his. In keeping with many, if not most, serial killers/multiple rapists/mass murderers, he blames his mother for all of his actions. She beat him, belittled him, never gave him a moment's peace.

And when he gained power over her, he turned the tables. 

Sadly, it's all too common a scenario. I remember sitting as a teenager, open-mouthed, as Edmund Kemper, the co-ed killer, blamed his mother for every one of his ills. Murderer, decapitator and necrophile as he was, it was obviously all mummy's fault for locking him in the basement when she feared he would molest his sisters. Old Ma Kemper was certainly a nutter, but nowhere near as much as her son, who ended up killing ten people, most of them young girls. 

Well, what is to be done with someone as far off the scale as Fritzl? He is clearly off his rocker by anyone's standards, but whether he's 'responsible for his actions' in a legal sense remains to be seen and no doubt the psychiatrists will continue to pick and poke at him to see what they can find.