Talking Hoarsely

2012-01-01T21:56:00.003Z

Eurofail#

Ok, it's been a while. Mostly I've been observing rather than commenting anywhere- just the occasional tweet from me - @Edtho in case you'd like to follow. But what a lot to observe. From where I sit the view of the Eurocrisis is just fascinating. It's all a question of to what extent anyone's in control and whether this is a "beneficial crisis" or a crisis of real proportions.

As I see it now it's a bit of both. Germany's Merkel clearly is in the best position and looks like the director, but it suddenly occurred to me that she's like Elsa in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The ground opens up and the grail slips down and lodges on a ledge below. That's German Euro-hegemony, in my analogy. Elsa (Alison Doody- Mrs Merkel) is reaching down for the Grail- stretching, stretching and she just can't reach while holding firmly to the floor above her. Well, the Germans don't actually have what it takes to solve the crisis without help, do they? They can bail out Greece but how about Spain? However, the idea of German virtue conquering all in Europe is so attractive to Elsa (Merkel) that she defies reality and keeps on stretching. Meanwhile, Indiana Jones (Cameron- ha) would like to dissuade her from the unrealistic over-reach. In the end, the grail is more attactive than the solid ground and Elsa's grasp of the latter slips as she pursues the former. And there you have it- a prediction for 2012, I suppose.

The divergence from the analogy is that it isn't Elsa (Merkel) who is lowering herself over the abyss for the grail, but the PIIGS who are being lowered- that's why the grail is so overwhelmingly attractive- because Germany doesn't appear to be in the forefront of risk. I think that could be somewhat illusory though, which is the exciting twist in the tail. To be continued....

2010-11-23T21:18:00.000Z

A rare insight:

“Substance,” here, is beside the point, and this enrages a certain spectrum of the intelligentsia. As for Barbara Bush, her husband had not one iota of star power; her son had a little, but his qualities—non-eloquence, an Everyman outlook, a red-state appeal—are Sarah Palin’s, too… a closeness that may embarrass Barbara Bush more than a little, and really sting.

2010-09-30T04:14:00.000Z

Two Ideas... (that work for me)

Calling Gordon and the BBC

2010-09-19T08:54:00.003Z

The importance of options: no need to BRIC it (part deux)

Liam Halligan comments on currency games in Japan. The Japanese have been trying to reduce the overblown value of their currency to help exporters. The reason it has strengthened is because currency investors wanted to find a currency outside the Euro or Dollar in which to hedge. The upside of the strengthening might be the ability of Japanese firms to make investments abroad. It is an old game which is being played with a new intensity in the modern era.

(click timestamp below to read more)

I think it shows us something about the vigour of international trading which explains why things haven't yet gone belly up in the economies of the US and Europe, despite politicians which have colluded with financiers in making all the wrong moves. While people can still shift money around to places where the structural set up, although weak, is differently oriented to the "nitro-glycerine" embedded-in-debt West, there remains some dynamism, some profit motive and a chance to dance around the pitfalls created by cratering financial institutions and Governments.

Furthermore, trade is weirder and more dynamic than ever. While I understand the odd cultural forces which produced it, I was nonetheless surprised to hear than many chickens consumed at British institutions are in fact Halal meat from Turkey. Yes, yes, shocking erosion of culture and all that- I agree- but most immediately this is a story about increasing trade. We can deal with the political takeover dimension of this later- the fact is that people and goods are more mobile than ever, prices, supply and transport more flexible than ever. Also, there must be a network of youngish guys developing contacts and networks to make this happen; this brings us back to the question of demographics. Turkey has them on its side; we get the chicken. Again, a mixed blessing you may think from the cultural point of view, unless you're too busy stuffing your face.

The overall point I would make is this: the world economy may end up reprieving the silly bankers with their malinvestments by making real economic growth to cover their blushes. The silly bankers are clear that they will use every political prop to avoid responsibility for inflating a wave of transactions and riding it to destruction. Their excuse may be that they were anticipating a trend and didn't want to miss out on it, so they globalised ahead of themselves. As a defence it might have partial validity, but later on I will scratch deeper to show if I can what charlatans these people really were.

2010-09-05T19:53:00.012Z

No need to BRIC it yet...

A year ago for some wee wee publication I wrote:

"more than a third of the world's population lives in... China, Brazil and India. Together with Russia... they have been called the „BRICs“ (Brazil, Russia, India, China) by many economists. The problem is that the world is not used to an economy which is built on the BRICs. People question whether the BRICs can continue growing without US and EU economic leadership."

(click the timestamp below for more; I haven't got this "read more" feature sorted yet. PS I've been considering matters economic in recent times, so this is something I might be adding to the content here, which sad to say I neglected)

I think we may be answering this question now, although perhaps the BRICs might need expanding to some wider acronym. I noticed today that Nigeria's economy is set to grow this year by 10%. Mmmm. They say demography is destiny and that's one reason for optimism for the world economy: whole cohorts of youngsters turning productive just as the world gets connected in ways hitherto unknown.

Liam Halligan has a typically good piece in the Telegraph where he lists a string of positive data about the world economy - note I underline the word world. We simply might find that despite our corrupt bankers, moribund populaces and monochrone political numpties, we can't avoid the boom caused by the babies of the last quarter century or so, buzzing as they are with new communications gear. Halligan feels it "noteworthy that the latest IATA monthly air-traffic report shows that worldwide air-freight – itself, a reliable predictor of overall world trade volumes, a kind of lead-lead-indicator – continued to expand strongly during July, as did premium air travel."

Indeed. Actions speak louder than words. However, it's not all good news.

Also a while back, in another wee publication, I wrote about the notion of "decoupling", where "it is possible for some areas to continue growing while others contract."

Then I hedged my bets, so to speak:

"Well, can it happen? Does it happen? The answer seems to be “sort of” or “more or less maybe”."

I really suspected it could and I think we could be seeing it right now. Just as Japan became the sick old man of the world economy without stopping growth elsewhere in the 1990's, so the debt overhang and inflationary "quantitative easing" (which sounds like it might involve a measured amount of laxative) might be setting up conditions where we stagnate and they inflate. Most of our miserable pols wouldn't see that as too bad- a better way to enhance convergence than actually, you know, doing something.

2010-08-29T20:50:00.002Z

Woolmer again back in the spotlight:

Following up my latest post, see this remarkable blog from Jamie Pandaram of the Sydney Morning Herald where says:

"There still remains deep suspicion in Pakistan - despite no proof - that former coach Bob Woolmer was murdered by mafia types because he was set to expose match-fixing within his own team. The most sinister characters are linked to illegal bookmaking in the sub-continent, most notably Dawood Ibrahim, one of the world's most wanted terrorists, who has close links to Osama bin Laden. Some have suggested Ibrahim uses profits from his various gambling operations to fund butcher operations by al-Qaeda. Bookmakers are said to organise fixes with players, then place large bets with rival bookies to collect major winnings. One Indian bookmaker who believed he had been stung by a fix refused to pay up, and, fearing for his life, fled to South Africa. He was recently found chopped into seven pieces."

2010-08-29T18:12:00.004Z

Those crooked Pakistanis: the world around us

I was interested rather than shocked to learn of the fixing scam being carried out by at least a number of Pakistani cricketers, and it reminded me of a few things; not least how unusual a game cricket is. In some ways it might be considered the most popular game in the world, enthralling as it does 1.4 million asians plus a hundred million or so of other ethnicities. It could certainly be bigger than soccer when all is said and done. In addition, it's a sport of the Empire association which we know as the Commonwealth. Yet I suppose it's played internationally by only about 200 or so players, estimating generously. So, across India and in a couple of rich Western countries you have many thousands of bets on a game controlled by 22 players, or rather, by 11 players should they decide to play a certain way. In Pakistan gambling is officially banned. Playing a certain way with a certain objective is so much a part of cricket that it's regarded as a skill to get the result you want- usually considered to be a win or a draw depending on circumstances. It lends itself perfectly to corruption and no more so than when played by the 11 prima donnas elected for elevation by a teeming asian nation. With many players never having had access to such money as the game offers, but that money swamped by its gambling action, the temptations are massive.

Yet Pakistan, rather than India, is the country with the bad reputation. Why is that I wonder? It may be because the Pakistani players are paid much less than their international counterparts. I suspect it might also be to do with the fact that gambling is a non-Islamic tradition, and therefore the players can enrich themselves at the expense of dhimmis in their "ill-conceived" "favourite" activities. Apparently key players and the captain were in on the scam- and as former cricketer myself I can say that it would be difficult for ordinary players not to know about such activities.

Was the whole match fixed, or just parts of it? According to Michael Slater here, cricket holds the most money in betting outside of horseracing. He says that "spread betting" was the approach that the Pakistanis were playing to. What you can bet on in a cricket match I can't exactly say, but I know the potential is endless. However it does seem that the Pakistanis were also at times playing to the biggest gambling topic of all- the result.

In all this there is another thing this reminded me of: the death of Bob Woolmer in suspicious circumstances during Pakistan's world cup campaign of 2007. There was talk then that Woolmer had confronted players over possible corruption. This would be at about the same period as the man arrested over fixing, Mazhar Majeed, claims to have been involved with the team's fixing activities. I wonder why the Pakistanis needed a new partner after Woolmer's death, since Majeed claims that he was approached by the players rather than vice versa, and this is information we know from the confidence he shared with the investigating journalists...

to whom we owe a debt of gratitude and an acknowledgement that surely someone with Pakistani origins or connections, possibly investigating journalist Mazher Mahmood, was needed to provide the insights and the contacts which led to the uncovery of the scam. If so, then Civilization 1 - the Barbarians at the gates 0 is the real result of this contest. But the darker question of the real fate of Bob Woolmer remains.

2010-07-29T06:48:00.004Z

Sense of direction

The event of a new Government in the UK reawakened my interest in politics there. It seemed only sensible to hibernate (even emigrate) during NuLabour's nuclear winter of toxic bubbles and exponential increases (in housing, immigration, debt, spending, incompetence etc). NuLabour had decided so many questions ideologically that all you heard about was the presentational detail, particularly as the State's mouthpiece, the BBC, was given lavish auhority to set the news agendas.

Now I guarantee you will bear much more detail about politics, much more about dissent, and more about failure. After all, with a Libservative approach mistakes will be bugs rather than features (ooh ahh, views rather than scenery), with the exception of a few policy areas like energy and the environment, where lights going out may well be seen as a successful implementation of a policy of making everyone's personal energy needs fail to be met. When the policy objective is reducing standards of living it may well be easy to meet that objective, especially for those in prime positions like that of MPs and Ministers, or Prime and Deputy Prime Ministers.

To look on the really positive side of the Libservatives, one has to see that, amidst all their delighted abandon in slicing unwonted chunks out of each other's manifestos, they have determined at least to reform the National Health Service (a Tory election pledge notwithstanding, natch). This is the counter-argument to the one which says that Cameron is a closet commie. There could be no greater boon for Britain, and no greater boost for Conservatism, than reforming the Stalinist NHS. Doing so would be a fulfillment not of recent Conservative policy but of Liberal Democrat Orange Book philosophy- and Clegg himself is one of the major Orange Libservatives.

One more thought- Cameron may have a few deep games afoot in his posturing, on many fronts. Not least this might include the alienation of the so-called Tory Right. It's expedient now to do so in order to lash the Liberals to the mast of the coalition. Wait and see the fiscal Conservatism this enables... and meantime ditch any conceivable baggage that no-one has claimed for a decade or two.

2010-07-15T09:21:00.003Z

The New Government...

Is depressing, I have to say. The modern politician in Britain is so self-admiring that he prefers to have a beauty contest with various grades of beauty than a sense that some politics is human and other politics inhuman; thus in the post communist settlement all are shades of gray, Blair was on the right track until squished by Gordon; everything must be public/private cooperative; the EU is our ~~density~~ destiny etc.

I'm not sure if a Conservative Government under Cameron is worth having, except as a break from the slimeballs of NuLabour and a brake on their overweaning self-regard and confidence. I'm even less certain about a Libservative government which on the one hand preserves such institutions as the BBC and on the other extends the power of the EU to take on Foreign Office responsibilities.

Today's politicians are pleased as punch to be "in power", whatever that means. Well of course it means committees and delegations and protocol, plus influence, flattery and prestige. That's it? These guys are not worthy.

On the one hand they enjoy the trappings of a unique political position enjoyed by a class that benefits from hundreds of years of stable statehood, serene democracy and effectually expressed economic and military power; on the other hand they are the linchpins responsible for negotiating that away to the EU, lending the EU the credibility only we among European nations have, and reducing the nature of the country from effectual and dynamic to decorative and simply heritable.

2010-02-26T04:41:00.002Z

As the UK election approaches, more and more the NuLabour machine rages, and sadly to effect. I look forward to the day when we pursue people like Campbell and Mandelson and put them in the dock for conspiring to subvert the democratic process. It makes me so mad when I hear of the so-called "charity" Commission investigating the anti-bullying charity whose Chief Executive spoke out after Peter Mandelson denied any stories of bullying in No 10 Downing Street.

Where to start in the sorry mess? What about the Charity Commission- an over-politicised institution no doubt? What about the anti-bullying charity- understandably engrossed with political signals about the bullying issue? What about Mandy himself, "unleashing hell" on the charity and its leadership after it crossed his media spin operation. Mandy is the nearest thing the UK has to evil, the biggest bully boy of all.

2010-01-27T12:20:00.001Z

Susan Boyle disturbs home intruder

How dare she! He was probably trying to concentrate.

2009-11-03T18:35:00.002Z

Klaus signs; the battle for democracy begins by respecting the rules of the game

"1. The decision of the Constitutional Court was expected by me and I respect it, even though I fundamentally disagree both with its content as well its justification.

2. I can't endorse its form i.e. its legal quality. The ruling by the Constitutional Court is not a neutral legislative analysis but a biased political advocacy of the Treaty of Lisbon by its champions. This point is obvious from the entirely inappropriate, confrontational elaboration as well as the presentation of the verdict.

3. Most importantly, I cannot agree with the content because once the treaty becomes valid, the Czech Republic will cease to be a sovereign country, despite the political opinion of the court. This change is bringing legitimacy to the efforts of a part of our public that is not indifferent to our national and state existence and that doesn't intend to come to terms with these developments - efforts that will take place today as well as in the future.

4. I can't accept the Constitutional Court's decision to proclaim the obligation of the president of the republic to ratify this (or another) international treaty "without unnecessary delays" by references to the law about the Constitutional Court. This bill only deals with the work of the Constitutional Court: the rights and responsibilities of the president are defined exclusively by the constitution.

5. I inform that I signed the Treaty of Lisbon today, November 3rd, at 3 pm."

(Trans via Lubos Motl)

2009-08-15T15:40:00.003Z

Gordon Brown: what a ... words fail

The man is unbelievable. Which politician (or party) would invoke political history of 60 years ago to attempt to build political support today? Gordoom, that's who, in a letter to his supporters thanking them for their protective twittering over the future of the NHS.

"I have been profoundly moved by the enormous groundswell of support for the NHS in the last few days. A genuinely National Health Service – introduced by a Labour government in the teeth of opposition from the Conservatives and the medical establishment – is one of our nation’s finest achievements."

No political historian, me, but I do know that the NHS was based on the report commissioned by Winston Churchill produced by Sir William Beveridge. I also know that Churchill was one of the great social reformers and no opponent of the inception of the NHS. Furthermore, I know that Labour were elected with a landslide in 1945, so there is no possible way that the NHS could have been introduced in the "teeth of opposition from the Conservatives" as they had very few teeth remaining at that point.

Therefore Gordon is acting over the past as he acts concerning the present. Mendaciously.

2009-07-09T09:45:00.004Z

Touching togetherness

It's great to see how nuLabour pols have kissed and made up and that "big beasts" like two Jags Prescot and Charlie the safety elephant are back on message as "outsiders" calling for an investigation into some phone hacking (not tapping) conducted a couple of years ago by NotW.

There's a time when cronyism gets comical and this is it. Who exactly is going to authorise such an investigation other than Charlie and John's chums in Cabinet? Why should they do so 2 1/2 years after the events in question? Why moreover should Andy Coulsen resign twice for the same offence of lack of oversight which he already admitted candidly to when he served as NoTW news editor? One could carry on; the scandal dwindles almost infinitely down to a soodling thread, while the real scandal becomes the sheer swollen stupidity and hapless spontaneous ineptitude of a NuLabour cabal who think that all affronts to their standing have been staged, and seek to retaliate in kind, completely bovinely unaware that their bad publicity has stemmed from their bad actions, character and management; they haven't the wit even to seek a scapegoat, preferring to launch stink bombs at their opponents. May the big stick of the electorate thwack their conspiratorial bottoms!

2009-07-04T20:26:00.003Z

So Palin steps down as Alaska Governor and...

It's probably a masterstroke, but when you consider the amount of heat that will be expended by the navel gazing US media debating its cons, it will be better to keep out of it. I think it's the right move, in keeping with the anti-politics theme of the age. I think that it suggests that Palin recognises that her enemies have created her brand, whereas she had chosen her job (Governor), and that the brand was overshadowing the job. Thus this was cheating the electors who put her in place.

Now she is setting herself free to match her actions to a brand largely created by her enemies. Her enemies seemed to want an anti-abortion, small government bogeymom. Now perhaps they will have what they asked for, but without the folksiness of a small (population) state governor. It is a classic tactic to allow the weight of your opponent to create the momentum of his own fall; didn't Palin do judo some time?

The jury's out on that one.

2009-07-02T12:31:00.005Z

When to get Gordon?

For as got he must be, how shall the getting be accomplished?

Sounds rather Shakespearean, no? (it isn't, it's ooonly meee) But it appears that maybe Auntie Beeb is donning her Lady Macbeth costume for the good of her ideological spouse.

There are two good reasons I can imagine why the BBC might now be higlighting Gordoom's lies. One is that, of course, they can imagine how the Labour party's annihilation at the next election would leave them thoroughly exposed without political allies. Getting shot of Gordoom may lift that curse somewhat.

The second is that after more than a decade's support of Gordoom's lies (think pensions raiding, public spending, public spending again, immigration etc) they can see a cunning way to reverse perceptions of their weddedness to the New Labour leadership under Broon-Blair.

(oh, and there is always a third- they have little choice in light of the present public mood and with Gordoom's current ineptitude)

But it is indeed incredible to find Frazer Nelson on a BBC sofa discussing Brown's lies. Has it come to this?

Perhaps Lady Macbeeb has decided to stiffen the sinews of the Parliamentary Labour Party to do what must be done. T'were best it were done before the election.

2009-06-23T21:12:00.002Z

"It is a mistake to assume that the ayatollahs, cynical and corrupt as they may be, are acting rationally. They are frequently in the grip of archaic beliefs and fears that would make a stupefied medieval European peasant seem mentally sturdy and resourceful by comparison."

Quote of the day on the sophistication of Iran, by the inimitable Hitchens.

2009-06-16T20:31:00.002Z

Gordon did it

Personally I think that Keith Marsden is being charitable to Gordon Brown when he observes in the Wall Street Journal that "Mr. Brown cannot honestly deny all responsibility for Britain's recession". Brown created an open goal for the unstable or the unscrupulous in the banking sector- a man who spent much of his life mind you in outright opposition to the free economy. Gordon's ability to smile when it began to collapse was indicative of a man who fed the weaknesses knowing that he couldn't lose- Gordon is the biggest chancer of all.

2009-06-16T13:27:00.004Z

The Brothers Lewis

One edits the Telegraph, the other is to be Gordon Brown's chief spokesman. Just another Labourgraph link up.

It's about time Gordon Brown's operating strategies were properly articulated. I suspect that the reason he's stayed in power thus far is because he is able to point to successes behind the scenes- such as establishing communication bridgeheads into "middle Britain", such as politicising the police, granting sacred status to the NHS and nationalising the banks. When you look at it, it can be seen as nu-Labour mark II, the next stage in rejuvenating socialist principles, and that is I am sure how he can present it privately to his fellow-socialist fellow-travellers.

2009-06-08T00:46:00.002Z

Ha- all very glum on the panel at ~~Labour HQ~~ the BBC tonight. Euro elections not to the taste of Auntie Beeb.

2009-05-31T20:12:00.002Z

Nadine Dorries' blog is back again, and in the pink of health so to speak. Informative, chatty, confessional, overwrought; just a touch dizzy in the spelling department.

2009-05-24T06:37:00.011Z

In defence of Nadine Dorries, MP

It's funny to be writing this, but I somehow feel I ought to because this particular MP has been both courageous and insightful. Unless I am much mistaken, she has little to be ashamed of and much to recommend herself. To catch up on matters political I listened to a large chunk of Iain Dale's Play UK talk radio show. Iain's got great radio presence, but the calls are jarringly bad audio-wise. Anyhow, one early caller was apopleptic about Ms Dorries' intervention in the MPs' expenses issue- where she accused the Telegraph of running a witchhunt against MPs because they favoured parties such as the BNP and UKIP. That's the gist of things, anyway. I merely want to comment that I think she is right, essentially, in saying that the Telegraph's campaign is politically motivated. It follows on from my thoughts expressed earlier.

I think it stems from McBride and Andrew Porter, who rumour has it have that most intense of relationships- drinking partners.

The more I hear and read about expenses, the more I see it as an effective technique for smoking out the "conservative sleaze" meme on which the Labour party founded its 1997 election victory. Watching the Mckenzie-Kirkbride scandal unfold, and Douglas Hogg's "moat" and other issues, one is reminded that for Labour "Tory sleaze" was about staining the characters of their opponents, exposing them as not "one of us". Even if Labour MPs were the most dishonest bunch in the world, they would always know how to slip inside, or into the slip stream of, the mob baying against corruption. The essence of Labour politics has always been the management of the mob- for right or wrong- and it's always been the failure of Conservatives and Liberals to analyse and absorb those techniques which has left them with two left feet when the "public" is on the march. Only Maggie had a deft two-step; a kind of Joan of Arc chic routine.

To come back to Dorries and the McBride connection, I notice that a small but notable part of the Telegraph's expenses story against Dorries was the allegation that she had claimed for hotel expenses in London when Parliament wasn't sitting, and added to those claims a mini-bar drinks cabinet. Well, I seem to recall that one of McBride's smears to Draper involved allegations of hotel hi-jinks. Could it be that the Telegraph and McBride had actually collaborated in the development of that story? Did the Telegraph know about the hotel claims and extrapolate over a jar or two the possibility of Dorries' engaging in a little nookie on taxpayers' expense?

When McBride constructed his smears he was doubtless doing so from background information which he deemed might make it convincing. Having failed miserably and spectacularly thanks to Guido Fawkes, could McBride have turned to Porter and asked for the nuclear option? To enrage the mob by blowing up the whole issue of MPs' financial behaviour, trusting in the native party-machine cunning of Labour embezzlers plus the Telegraph's cunning selectivity and timing to manage the fallout so that the Tories finally saw most of the damage. Given the building perception of Labour incompetence and sleaze, McBride and Labour, and probably even Gordon Brown, had nothing to lose.

So back to Dorries. Why did she accuse the Telegraph as she did? Well, not I think because the Telegraph are BNP supporters. I think because she was desperate to raise the issue of the Telegraph's connivance against her and colleagues. Raising it now, so that it can be examined later. Raising it now because it's the closest thing to reality and a real understanding of what's been going on in secret behind closed doors or shouted conspiratorally over the hubbub of a throbbing bar.

It might be more accurate to describe the Telegraph as doing Labour's business, but who would believe that? Didn't the Telegraph, after all, begin with Government ministers in their expose? The reality seems to be that the Barclay brothers and their Telegraph editorship want a more pliable, clubbable alternative to the prospective Cameroons embodied in the Mckenzies and the Dorries. They want nu-Labour lite, Mcbride and other pragmatists; corporate socialism which has them at its core. One cannot say exactly what they want but one can say that they want influence.

So maybe they do want the BNP, after all.

2009-05-17T15:28:00.003Z

He's got a point

Richard North says that the issues run deeper than expenses.

Yes, but.

People are looking to make political change, not an ideal world.

It's surely obvious that MEP's expenses afford worse abuses than Westminster's, but the difference is we can get at our MPs and that's where concerned people have to begin.

Only when we've got tough on our MPs will any of them scrutinise MEPs- ditto for the newspapers.

Concern about Parliament equals resistance against Strasbourg.

The issue about expenses relates to the housing crisis- so many MPs becoming land owners through taxpayer's money- especially nuLabourites on the make. How could MPs scrutinise inflationary issues when they relied on the rise in house prices to maximise the value of their taxpayer afforded second homes?

But actually, Richard would have more of a point if he tried to put meat on the bones of Hannan and Carswell's Plan. I just don't think Richard likes Hannan very much...

2009-05-11T20:08:00.006Z

Labourgraph at it again...

This blog has never in its lifetime been a fan of the Daily Telegraph. I hate to use words like "infiltrated" because such words have no class- but then again nor does the Telegraph or its New Labour allies. So to use the word about the Telegraph is probably apt. They have been ever more compromised by associations with New Labour attack dogs and their poodle chums at the BBC, and all the mutts involved are thoroughly wormy.

For a moment back there (ooh, three days ago) I was half-tempted to believe that it had got its mojo back. Alas not. The DT is about to launch a fresh attack on Tory MPs over expenses.

It is evident that MPs are rich targets, but consider how the DT have attacked- first New Labour, the Government. Yes, that was sensible as their core readers are Conservatives who like the smell of Labour reputations smouldering in the morning. But the DT knows that Labour is already damaged goods. What they are doing by raising the whole expenses issue the way they are is levelling the playing field. They are enabling a new tabula rasa to emerge, with Gordon Brown able to claim a kind of twisted moral leadership; a one-eyed man in the land of the blind he will assert with his grotesque sense of entitlement.

It seems somehow inconceivable that Gordon can bludgeon his way out of his desperate mess of a government, but there is this uncomfortable sense that he could that's rather like the feeling most horror films give you about two thirds of the way through. He's not dead yet. Much more so than with Tony Blair, who was somewhat closer to Frankenstein's creator than the monster himself, I feel the need for that final killing mechanism; to mix marques, that stake through the heart that shows the monster is really through and that you can relax in your seats. The true horror of horrors is that the ending is beyond your control- so this horror story probably still has some way to run

2009-04-15T20:01:00.002Z

Confession- I once debated to reinstate the death penalty in the UK. And won. Ok, we were 17 at the time, but...

Actually, why am I confessing that? I still believe in it and stories like one about a brutish, totally evil Serb who stabbed his wife to death make me certain I was right. Yes I know there's the thing about the wrongful conviction scenario, but people rarely consider that for the highest penalty the evidential requirement would, could and ought to be of Mnt Sinai proportions. Consider the case of the evil Serb. Is there any doubt about it?

2009-04-13T12:27:00.002Z

Damage limitation

The BBC's article about "key people" involved in "smeargate" is rather hopeless. We get to hear about McBride, Draper and Guido Fawkes (Paul Staines), but that is all. What about Tom Watson, Charlie Whelan and Gordon Brown? Limiting the scandal to the former three is confining it to the status of backroom vs blogger spat (and btw what's going on with Draper's photo- the last time he looked like that was surely around the time that things could only get better?). Whelan was apparently copied in on the emails, and helping to fund Draper's Labour List through his union position at UNITE. Tom Watson is parliamentary secretary at the Cabinet Office, "proppa blogga" and co-author of a Cameron spoof video with Sion Simon MP which went viral through its very awfulness and unpleasantness. The medium, the nature and the origin (the Cabinet Office) of the dirty tricks campaign were right out of the heart of Watson's political territory.

Nadine Dorries writes today that Radio Five Live said in advance of an interview that they "were being leaned on by lawyers with regard to any reference to Tom Watson MP and before I went on, would I just be aware of that". Sounds like a cover story to me- because Watson is unquestionably worthy and uncontroversially part of the context of the scandal of the smear campaign. Could the BBC really be as submissive to nuLabour as not to realise that? Mention of him need only be reference to his position next to McBride in Gordon's bunker. Apart from that, he was either copied the emails or not- but why would he need to be if he could read them over McBride's shoulder. And isn't Watson's proximity to events and authority over those responsible key too?

All of which does not explain for a moment why Whelan and the Prime ~~Mentalist~~ Minister were left out of the equation. What would explain it is the BBC's soft heart towards their cherished nuLabour project.

2009-04-05T19:47:00.004Z

Obamateurism

"It was also interesting to see that political interaction in Europe is not that different from the United States Senate. There's a lot of -- I don't know what the term is in Austrian -- wheeling and dealing -- and, you know, people are pursuing their interests, and everybody has their own particular issues and their own particular politics."

(from his press conference in Strasbourg). (hat-tip Lubos Motl)

2009-04-05T19:28:00.003Z

I couldn't be Baracked

Barack was in Prague today, home of this blog but rarely mentioned in it. I had too much to do to go and see the One make his speech in the castle, but watching the speech I see the hazy sunshine somewhat spoilt the vista of the Golden City behind Obama's shoulder (though it did look very golden as a result). The speech was an odd one really, mostly about nuclear disarmament. He talked a lot about the power of peaceful protest- didn't mention Ronald Reagan once, or the US military build up, or the star wars project which all combined to help crush Russian morale and free the dissident movement in then Czechoslovakia.

The first three or four minutes were nice, tailored, script-written homilies to local colour and US ties. The next twenty were triagulating politics trying to garb itself in dopey peacenik idealism. The mulitlateral schtick went down wellish. He refrained from too much global warming schtickiness, possibly out of respect to sceptical Klaus the Czech President. Not too much about the "road to hell" (aka trillion $ stimuli) either.

All in all he didn't destroy the brand, but he isn't developing it either. I have grave fears about where his leadership, such as it is, will leave the US and the world three or four years down the road. Road to hell? Road to nowhere? Or just plain old schtick creek without a paddle?

2009-03-08T10:31:00.001Z

Coincidences (Irish edition)

So, Democrat Barack Obama's in power and Hillary is talking about talking to everyone Bush wouldn't talk to.

Gordon Brown confers a knighthood on Teddy Kennedy.

The world economy is in crisis, and the Irish is more than most, with unemployment in the South rocketing.

Martin McGuinness calls British troops in Northern Ireland a "major threat".

Two days later two British soldiers are killed and six wounded in a terror attack on a UK Northern Irish base.

2009-02-20T19:18:00.002Z

Watch Russia

To some it might sound belated to say this, to others pretty much an odd point to make. Nevertheless Russia is certainly shaping something up and it is not pretty. Consider:

Today Iran hails their close ties with Russia as a leading weapons supplier. Yesterday Kyrgistan issue an "eviction note" to a US military base key to the US' efforts in Afghanistan.

To that we could add last August's invasion of Georgia, the ongoing threats and posturing over the US' plans for radar bases in Poland and the Czech Republic and the divide and "conquer" strategy applied to the supply of natural gas to Central and Western Europe via Ukraine.

That's without even mentioning Alexander Litvinenko and Ana Politskaya.

What we can see is a combination of intimidatory "testing" of the resolve of Western nations, and the strategic undermining of their positions in areas where they have, wittingly or by blind necessity, declared an interest.

Those seem to be the knowns. What are the known unknowns? How bad the Russian economy is, how deep the revival in their technology, science and military has been, and who they have secretly formed alliances with (Iran would be on my list of suggestions). All I can say is that a lot can be hidden in the vastness of the Russian territorium and populace. And this enigma is a mystery I don't wish particularly to see unriddled (cf Winston Churchill's original)

2009-02-01T11:35:00.005Z

And again.

I am nothing to do with finance, and even little readjustments in financial arrangements stress me out- I even hate taking precautionary measures to my very basic financial set-up, like opening a second major bank account (why should I? Bank accounts are safe and boring, right?). So it's strange to contemplate that ever since the financial crisis even reared its head in 2007 I've been of the same opinion, which I am more and more convinced is the right one. You identify the dodgiest banks or sections of banks, liquidate them, hand on any left-over viable assets along with the accounts held in those dodgy banks to banks with a reasonable chance of survival having been less egregiously risk-oriented and bonus-fixated.

Here comes the difficult bit- you then identify the prime-movers behind the risk-taking and prosecute them for failing in their fiduciary duty to shareholders and for recklessly and knowingly defrauding the financial system. This last part is not covered by Roger Ehrenberg's post, but the first part is.

He concludes his post:

"sometimes the most complex problems can be addressed with the most simple solutions"

Hear, hear. I simply agree with him.

2008-11-30T22:15:00.002Z

"The Government needs to get tough. The nation's top bankers must be called to a private room and be forced to put their cards on the table – fully disclosing their exposure to sub-prime liabilities in the UK and elsewhere. It should be made clear that any executive who withholds information, which it can later be proven they knew, will be subject to criminal prosecution.

Once the exposures are clear – or clearer – we need further consolidation. The weaker banks that have made the worst decisions must be subsumed by stronger, more prudent institutions. That's how capitalism works, or is supposed to work. But ministers and regulators are blocking this fundamental purging process, preventing credit markets from rebooting and storing up untold problems for the future."

At last my own preferred outline articulated. Link here

Since we need a "tough government" and not a stalinist one, we had better get a new one. Fast.

2008-09-01T07:43:00.001Z

2008-08-19T20:12:00.008Z

Olympian Games

It's entirely predictable that the Olympics have become mostly about politics. In fact, it seems to me they've become a touchstone for who we are.

To take four (maybe five) nations, it seems clear the Olympics tell us a lot.

China's been face-spending from the start (normally they try and save face - this time they're spending it). All the chicanery with the opening ceremony (something I never, ever watch but heard about this time), and all the kerfuffles about their gymnasts, speak volumes about the nature of the Dragon, weaving a spell of invincibility through aggressive trickery.

Then there's Russia- who simply aren't trying to win the Olympics, but find them convenient for invading other people's lands. A country who've had enough lean times to know you can't eat, drink and be merry on old Gold medals from fixed events past.

The USA meanwhile, are taking it easy while sizing up the Bear. Not straining to beat the little yellow people they are just strolling along through the endeavours of their nuclear threat (Phelps) and their excellent missile defense (the entire basketball team). The trickery of the Chinese doesn't bother them none (well, they're not admitting it), and they can see that the Chinese mainly do well when there are judges involved in awarding medals.

Just a little aside now to look at the Australians. As ever their culture is defined by the glance sideways at Britain- and they never get much beyond that; part envious, part contemptuous, part lustful, part (maybe) affectionate.

Finally the Brits. It's golden time for the British competitors. Evidently we concentrated out lottery cash and made it worth people's while to stay in training continuously. And then the advertising revenue follows... But somehow it gives me only that instinctive pleasure I get from British success in anything, and sporting success from anyone, combined. Pleasurable yes, but... it's this hilarious success built on gambling which is so unreal. Truth be told, not many countries sail wondrous varieties of boats, or row in crews, or invest in all the cycling gear, or care about the Olympics the way we do. Not that it's wrong- it's actually good. Yet to build self-esteem on this flimsy and fake international festival seems to be so much bullshit. Is it me, or do things seem to be falling apart? The center apparently is partying in Peking, and cannot hold. The Russians are in Georgia, the Taliban is rising, the Pakistanis revolting, the economies on which we are founded dissolving in debt. Only Iraq is good- and they were nearly banned.

2008-08-11T20:56:00.003Z

An authority speaks (a little less delusionally than is usual)

"Historians will come to view Aug. 8, 2008, as a turning point no less significant than Nov. 9, 1989, when the Berlin Wall fell. Russia's attack on sovereign Georgian territory marked the official return of history, indeed to an almost 19th-century style of great-power competition, complete with virulent nationalisms, battles for resources, struggles over spheres of influence and territory, and even -- though it shocks our 21st-century sensibilities -- the use of military power to obtain geopolitical objectives. Yes, we will continue to have globalization, economic interdependence, the European Union and other efforts to build a more perfect international order. But these will compete with and at times be overwhelmed by the harsh realities of international life that have endured since time immemorial. The next president had better be ready."

I readily agree that Russia has confirmed that it is what it seemed to be - a despotic power still. The amount of money sloshing around there is frightening though, as a backdrop to this. I have to say I had to restrain myself at the sight of Bush waving his little US flag at the Olymics, as if it matters. But then, in the back of my mind I always think of Drake's game of bowls, and in truth there's nothing like staying calm.

I think that Kagan's notion that the EU will simply sail cautiously through is very optimistic- the EU has gathered together in weakness, and is like a herd of ruminants which has suddenly discovered there's a tiger in the bushes; the tiger is wounded by history and pretty hungry too.

2008-08-08T19:54:00.005Z

A good day for burying.... what!?

The opening of the Olympics in that bird's nest (not that this sports fan cares much) and Russia invades Georgia. George Bush has a quiet word in Pute's ear (as they watch the opening ceremony in Beijing) and stares into his honest eyes on what the Chinese believe is one of history's luckiest days (08/08/08), which also happens to be that on which leading Democrat John Edwards admits to his affair with some woman whom nobody would care about had Edwards not been the "values" candidate playing happy families and "rock" to a seriously ill spouse, and had he not lied about it repeatedly in a brazen post-Clintonesque way.

It ought to be the silly season.

2008-08-06T20:26:00.003Z

Gorilling news

Well, I am very pleased to hear that Gorilla numbers are higher than they've been saying for the last 20 years.

One personal observation I made while I lived for a spell in Africa was how much better at living alongside nature Africans (Kenyans specifically) were than they were generally perceived to be. Flora of all kinds and forna of all except snakes were pretty much welcome. They don't like things eating their cows or their crops, but outside of direct provocation, Africans are pretty harmless to animals. One reason why Africa is less developed is that Africans like widening their eyes to nature, and going with its flow. But that's by the bye, I guess.

2008-07-28T06:48:00.002Z

Can we burn the fiddlers yet?

"Swedish unemployment suddenly jumped from 5.9 per cent to 8.1 per cent"

Seasonally adjusted?

Anatole Kaletsky sounds an optimistic note concerning the world economy. Personally I'm a pessimist, but mainly relating to the UK economy. Others around the world will continue to grow as the banks reign in UK spending and the housing market goes way way down.

Yet what is interesting to me about the Swedish statistics is that they are so dramatic. I suppose it could be a routine matter, relating to the end of university courses in June/July, but if so then why is it highlighted?

The more I see of statistics in governments, the more I question. Of course I know there are lies, damned lies, etc, but I think that that very truism has been exploited to the limit. After all, when statistics are massaged- and dahhling they obviously are- you're left to "trust" the masseurs. But the truth is that at the end all statistics mean something concrete to someone somewhere and are not just means of manipulating paltry currents of franchise- ie. voters.

An interesting thing that Kaletsky points to is the division between economists and financiers- the latter being the pessimists- " The consensus view among economists, as opposed to financiers, at present is that the United States is experiencing, at worst, a mild recession"... . It occurs to me that that's because financiers are the ones who are performing the sums and to whom these sums have real-life consequences. Declining fortunes are real-life enough. Future income opportunities are real-life enough.

It all brings me nicely to Richard North's post about data manipulation. It rather disappoints me (naive as I must be) that people resort to crude data manipulation. It's a brutal but effective way of coralling those you distrust and dislike, and it doesn't require a terrible deal of intellect. Most boring and most damaging- I think it will be seen as most criminal too, in the long run.

2008-07-21T17:27:00.000Z

„because there is no-one who has a monopoly of patriotism, there is no one who can claim that he has a monopoly of the sovereign will of the people... I hope that all of us who are signatories to this memorandum always must bear in mind the mother and the child who goes to sleep without food, the people who have been brutalised, the divisions and the hate speech... I hope that that is the world of the past“

The admirable Morgan Tsvangirai speaking at a press conference carried by the BBC. Truth-telling is not a quality associated with African leaders. Tsvangirai sounds about as good as I've heard. The world of the future, perhaps?

Congratulations Tsvangirai, congratulations Zimbabwe.

2008-07-11T20:38:00.004Z

The billion dollar bluffs

Iran's leadership must be laughing in its boots at the results of their missile trickery the other day. Oil hits a new high, Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac plunge towards the rocks (these laughably named mortgage lenders).

Did you know that Osama Bin Laden targeted high oil prices in his scheme to lay the West low? Well, he did (yes, I read Drudge too).

I wouldn't mind putting a little flutter myself- on the bearded one actually being harboured in Iran. The old Sunni-Shia-elite two step.

2008-06-22T11:24:00.004Z

Character observations

It's interesting to observe politics and ask oneself who makes a good leader, and why.

As GW Bush approaches the last stretch of his presidency, Andrew Roberts writes an historian's assessment of his time in office. He opens with one of those so-easy-to-mess up accounts where he is actually describing another President, also unpopular at the time, but now well regarded. He focusses mainly on the international agenda, as has the President most of the time. What emerges is a nascent narrative of success, concealed by personal unpopularity.

Potentially Bush's Presidency could become seen as a rare triumph for humanity in politics- achieved in the teeth of the failing political machine of Congress and under the incurious eyes of the fouth estate. I like this idea. I watched Adam Boulton interview the President and his wife last weekend, and I found myself wishing there'd been more of Bush to be seen over the last few years in such settings. It has always been the hostile press conference, or the stiff formal occasion, that has been Bush's staple and his responsibility. In the Boulton interview, the high pitched guffaw which I am sure has got the goat of many a BBC journalist (eg. Matt Frei??) was in evidence, and with it, a quick and fundamentally sound mind sought to get a high vantage point to deal responsibly and with vigour and optimism with the relatively reasonable probing of Sky's top man. It was both fun and real- qualities generally appreciated by ordinary people but so uninteresting to the studiously polticised elite.

So much for character- Bush's character and his personality are at one, which is his fundamental strength.

By contrast Gordon Brown has received many a sympathetic treatment from the BBC. At one time the in depth cosy chat with Andrew Marr was virtually bi-weekly, as Gordon sought to recreate the image of Uncle Harold (Wilson) to reassure voters and burnish his credentials as a man of depth. The whole thing was image-based, even after Gordon had pledged an end to spin as he entered Downing Street.

Now Guido Fawkes and the Conservative media team have given Gordon a complete makeover of their own. Fawkes (who is evidently quite a brilliant man) highlights the Conservative take up of his idea and says "Destroying the reputation of Gordon was easy once they tried - because he had a false reputation"

2008-06-18T04:17:00.003Z

Zeitgeist: Mr Schultz is not for amending

"We would be a laughing stock at the end of the day. Nothing that is being criticised about the treaty is in the treaty"

Funny things, laws. It's actually rather uncommon that anyone can pinpoint much specific that a law does that anyone can get worked up about. It always does more than it says it does, because it sets a framework, demonstrates a direction, and lets an army of professional understanders of laws go to work on the practise of it.

In this statement from Mr Schultz (brought to my attention by the ever-excellent EU Ref blog from an article here), is the casual arrogance of our EU overlords. It's just this desire to save face, combined with arrogation of the right to make laws mean what they want them to mean when they want it, which has characterised despotism since time immemorial.

I appreciate that MR Schultz is a busy man, and that he has a big project afoot in which he is but a elevated functionary, but he cannot escape Europe's old malady. He's just another fascist when it comes to it.

2008-06-14T19:34:00.005Z

Irresistible force - the referendum - has met immoveable object - the need for every EU member state to ratify the Lisbon Treaty.
- Jonny Dymond, BBC

Hang on a moment- let's re-write that:

Irresistible force- EU politicians' desire to integrate- has met immoveable object- the unwillingness of the popular vote to lose its distinctive voice.

I think my version's better, because it deals with what the Irish vote actually represents: resistance to unwanted political leveraging. How many popular votes do we have to sit through before we're allowed to say that? (how many popular votes will we be allowed to sit through? As few as possible, methinks)

The BBC's desire to frame the debate inside its favoured assumptions- the inevitability of EU integration, with the increasing of power at the centre and discounting of traditional national distinctions- trumps fair reportage almost every time.

Jonny Dymond gives some fine examples of this.

He says „the wonkiest minds in Europe were speculating as to how the European Union could dig itself out of the Ireland-shaped hole“

The issue for the peoples of Europe is not particularly „wonky“, its a matter of self-determination, appropriate local governance etc. Dymond states (probably quite accurately) the considerations of the Irish- „abortion, neutrality, tax sovereignty, military conscription, the loss of an Irish commissioner, the deregulation of the taxi trade“ - but fails to make the obvious connection; all these points embody those things that people want their own government of their own nation to decide. The peoples' project is very simple indeed put in those terms.

Dymond doesn't get it though, but says instead „Amending the Lisbon Treaty to encompass those objections would challenge even the mightiest Euro-minds.“

Look, whose side is he on that he can't make the obvious connection instead of lamenting from the perspective of the EU?

He talks of a „bewildering array of objections“ when in fact they all boil down to the concern that local needs will be overrun by the concerns of grand powers- it's the age-old call of democratic enfranchisement.

Dymond is besotted by the power game and cannot see the social reality: „there are serious players that want the changes laid out in the Treaty and will not give them up without a fight at the say-so of fewer than a million stroppy Irish voters“

He may consider such language to be ironic, but he elsewhere gives no sign that he senses a rationality in the electorate.

When Dymond says that Irish voters „are not dumb“ you sense he thinks he is being balanced. Does he ever allow for the idea that it's the „serious players“ who are dumb? Now that would be a kind of balance- and its so routinely absent from the BBC regarding the „colleagues“ in Europe, as it is indeed about all polticians everywhere. He who pays the piper calls the tune, as they say.

2008-06-12T20:15:00.005Z

Smart Move

At it's most basic level, it seems to me that's what David Davis's resignation is- for so many reasons.

I read this excellent piece on the Devil's Kitchen by Martin, and it was so odd to have it echoed by the addendum which indicated the call to liberty had been answered. No, that's too grand. I'm no great commentator, but if it energises the libertarians back to the Tories, embarrasses the Labour party with a popular test of its allegedly popular hard-line on 42 days, and keeps Cameron honest in being small government, what's to dislike? There's much more, too, but I just savour the bravura of the move- which is nonetheless smart.

Update via the man himself:

"Labour must put up a candidate to debate and defend their draconian track record. Anything else would demonstrate supreme political cowardice and contempt for public opinion."

Indeed.

Second update: my view on this hasn't changed despite the hostile reaction of the press, for instance The Sun. Davis has connected this move to a variety of oppressive measures, not only 42 days' detention without trial. The authoritarian drift of the Government has been a legitimate concern for a long time. Opinion polls which indicate 70% support for 42 days miss the fact that people have been coerced to accept many authoritarian concepts without a choice- ID cards, CCTV, widespread speed cameras, the whole surveillance society. Davis's move is against this tide, and people will take time to consider that for the first time in a long time they are seeing the glimmer of a choice in the matter.

2008-06-09T04:44:00.006Z

Sorry for the lack of blogging. I have had a number of deadlines to keep. And then there was this:

It's a pic from the river in Cesky Krumlov. I rafted.

2008-05-25T10:36:00.005Z

A Gathering of Post-modern Twee

It is an ambition of mine never to attend the Hay on Wye literary festival.

I formed this ambition in the last few seconds reading about the latest line-up of authors and their antics.

First up was Gore Vidal, generationally speaking a member of America's Greatest. He was talking about how in the good old days despite a man's best efforts the fruit of his loins might evade abortion.

Then there was Cherie Blair, who was talking of her passion to weaken the barriers (ie. men) that afflict womankind. She hasn't done that already with Tony?

Then finally an insipid Hague, Fffion, with her coyly titled "The Women in Lloyd George's Life". Not Lloyd George's women, then, after all?

And what is post-modern twee? It is the denial of anything outside the acutely vulnerable selfish obsessions of post-modern western sensibility, the historically one-eyed, geo-politically ignorant, fey yet avaricious closed circle of sheepshearers we call our educated literary classes.

2008-05-23T04:54:00.002Z

...and what you need to keep in mind through the poem below is... Obama's father left him when he was two! More Obamidian information here.

2008-05-18T17:03:00.004Z

Why Barack Obama is not John Kerry.

Not my usual thing, I know, but I have to say that Barack Obama's poetic juvenillia is not at all bad, written while he was a student aged about 20 and published in a now-defunct journal. Since its now defunct I suppose it might be safe to post one example, which I can at least say I mostly understand even at first reading. This poetry takes a bit of talent to produce, and that's what makes Obama clearly different from Kerry and makes the significance of his liberal hauteur much harder to read. Maybe Obama's just got something. From the New York Times, which just got me on their member's list.

Here goes:

"POP

Sitting in his seat, a seat broad and broken
In, sprinkled with ashes
Pop switches channels, takes another
Shot of Seagrams, neat, and asks
What to do with me, a green young man
Who fails to consider the
Flim and flam of the world, since
Things have been easy for me;
I stare hard at his face, a stare
That deflects off his brow;
I’m sure he’s unaware of his
Dark, watery eyes, that
Glance in different directions,
And his slow, unwelcome twitches,
Fail to pass.
I listen, nod,
Listen, open, till I cling to his pale,
Beige T-shirt, yelling,
Yelling in his ears, that hang
With heavy lobes, but he’s still telling
His joke, so I ask why
He’s so unhappy, to which he replies...
But I don’t care anymore, cause
He took too damn long, and from
Under my seat, I pull out the
Mirror I’ve been saving; I’m laughing,
Laughing loud, the blood rushing from his face
To mine, as he grows small,
A spot in my brain, something
That may be squeezed out, like a
Watermelon seed between
Two fingers.
Pop takes another shot, neat,
Points out the same amber
Stain on his shorts that I’ve got on mine, and
Makes me smell his smell, coming
From me; he switches channels, recites an old poem
He wrote before his mother died,
Stands, shouts, and asks
For a hug, as I shrink, my
Arms barely reaching around
His thick, oily neck, and his broad back; ’cause
I see my face, framed within
Pop’s black-framed glasses
And know he’s laughing too.

2008-05-17T14:45:00.003Z

"I find it outrageous that... garbage is being printed in journals that used to be prestigious and that average or downright stupid women and men who can't reach the ankles of people whom I consider scientists of global importance are being presented by dishonest journalists-activists as the world's leading scientists. This proliferation of idiots and parasites in the name of political correctness is just disgraceful. And it is very dangerous, too."

Lubos Motl, Physicist (formerly of Harvard), on an environ-mental "paper".

2008-05-11T20:01:00.004Z

cross-posted on Biased BBC

Spurious balance in the celebrity culture

Isn't it terrible how today we are exposed to so much idiocy, not least through the BBC, just because of the cult of celebrity?

The response to the post David Vance made on Biased BBC about "most disliked" BBC personalities just shows the flip-side to the pursuit of celebrity- which is that many people are sick of their inanity.

The Biased-BBC blog is about bias, but there are some intersecting themes. Sometimes a comment is made and reported not because of newsworthiness per se but because of celebrity. How can a journalist be balanced starting from a statement like "Chefs should be fined if they haven't got ingredients in season on their menu."? Mussolini, Hitler, would have been proud of such high kitchen standards.

If your ten year old brother said it you'd tell him to shut up, but if Gordon Ramsay said it, and you were a BBC journalist, it'd be "news" (there again, who made G.R. except the BBC-led media establishment?).

Two lines of criticism have been picked up by the BBC, unworkability! and trade for poorer countries, but as Neil Reddin points out, the biggest of all is missing: the freedom argument.

"See what was missing? Of course, there was no mention of consumers making their own choices over where their food comes from. Individual freedom and all that. Hard to believe that the BBC, an organisation funded by a mechanism that gives its consumers no choice, could miss that one *cough*."

2008-05-08T20:04:00.007Z

Editorial control

Over on BiasedBBC I posted about the BBC's juxtaposition of an article on re-classifying cannabis with an article on the effects of alcohol in the workplace.

Some people thought that a bridge too far: as if the BBC would actually position their stories strategically!

Well, I had to chuckle when I saw the Sun's frontpage on the web this evening:

I wonder if I am the only one to have been impressed by the caption "inside the mind of a monster" alongside Gordon Brown's face (as well as that abominable Austrian dad's). (image via Iain Dale)

2008-05-04T20:22:00.004Z

Signs of hope

I genuinely wish Boris all the best with his new job! Bye Ken. Bye lots of NuLab councillors. The BBC are obsessed with what they perceive as his negatives. The reality I suspect is far more homespun and genuine than people realise. We'll see.

Meanwhile, another hopeful sign is the realisation that the MMGW or simply the global warming debate is really not over, although warming itself might be. It's been a chilly old spring in Central Europe; rain, a little crisp sunshine, 10-19 degrees more or less. Booker has the climate lowdown. Motl always keeps me up to date. The climate in my view should never have been news at all. Events are news. Trends are open-ended, intrinsically undefinable and unstable.

When I watch something like this, an interview with the remarkable former slave from Sudan, Simon Deng, I am reminded just how wonderful are the African people, and how much we need to learn about the real world around us. Educational, especially concerning Israel and the UN.

2008-04-25T12:09:00.003Z

Proof of the pudding- or, how to make an idiot of yourself.

Two conflicting reports on the Basra situation. The Telegraph versus the Times

The appropriate response to events in Basra was "wait and see", but the Telegraph hadn't the necessary patience and instead preemptively declares the action a disaster. I've long had doubts about the UK military policy in Southern Iraq- when the Western relativist goes abroad, many avoidable mishaps accompany his overponderous and self-important particularity. That, and the fact that the British army (and cheerleading journalists) were so keen to preach their easy-going do-nothing gospel to the benighted Yankees, meant that I was ever so slightly sceptical...

Looks like Basra's better for some action.

Richard North has a go at the Telegraph here.

2008-04-19T18:35:00.005Z

Standards slipping

5/11/04: "Troops broke ban on hooding PoWs", reported the Daily Telegraph. Hooding was really, really bad.

19/05/08: "At no time during my captivity was I mistreated" reports British journalist who "was found in a house in Basra with his hands tied behind his back and a hood over his head, according to the Iraqi ministry of defence."
(report from BBC). And the Iraqis ought to know- after all, their soldiers rescued the civilian in question.

2008-04-13T19:36:00.002Z

Frauds fingered

It is taking a while, but the internet is starting to expose some of the previously untouchable people who climbed into positions of influence pre-internet and post-decent traditional standards of competence. The BBC is more and more sensitive to criticism- the bubble of complacency has been disturbed. Their response to criticism is in the main an ever more obstinate denial- sticking to their established lines without examining their context.

That's not to say that under the surface it isn't having a real impact and influence, entailing the consideration of views that they previously considered next to impossible.

But it isn't only the BBC that is coming under pressure. I am sure the Smith Institute is much more careful than previously what titbits they offer the likes of Guido Fawkes, and MPs are considering rather more carefully than hitherto their handling of expenses after the experience of one Mr Hain.

And now several Canadian "human rights" commissions have wandered into a hornets nest by attacking my old fave, master of letters Mark Steyn, who notes:

""The wacky world of human rights commissions": I love the insouciance of that first sentence, the assumption that every reader will get it. Before this thing started in December, Canadian newspapers didn't use phrases like that about their "human rights" enforcers. There's a long way to go, but these frauds have had the worst four months' publicity in their history."

Amen to that.

2008-04-07T05:59:00.003Z

Snow-blind.

While the BBC have been busy covering the icings of snow that have adorned many a picture-postcard photo from spellbound Britain, EURef have brought to my attention the terrible weather in Tibet- freezing temperatures over long periods endangering livestock and people at a time when their overrulers in China are far from happy with the country.

It's not so much this parochialism which is likely to be to blame as the BBC's tendency to screen out stories about prolonged cold temperatures- it gives too much credibility to people like this.
(thanks to ATW for the link)

2008-04-03T09:09:00.002Z

New dawn?

Well, maybe. Mine might be as stop and start as the people of Zimbabwe's, but we'll see. I must say the election result there was a delightful surprise and I am full of admiration just now at the enduring courage of Morgan Tsvangirai standing up to the old tyrant. His MDC have clearly been working on their territory to make it safe for their voters and booths.

The Beeb have now removed their report from the centre stage of their site. Maybe they don't want to stir things up there. The people have clearly worked hard to stir things up thus far, and hopefully it will prove far enough.

2008-02-14T12:45:00.001Z

Sorry for the absence.

I can't promise I'll be posting regularly just yet, but I should have completed a move from one flat to another by this weekend, so then we'll see about internet access...

2008-02-02T11:33:00.000Z

Caliphate near

Once again the French have proved themselves meddlesome inadequates when it comes to their Africa policy. Unlike the British, who never want to be tangled up there again, the French fancy themselves a bit of an African player on the ground.

That's the principle reason why Chad is about to be seized by Islamists coming out of Sudan. The French as guarantors of the continuation of stability have failed. Whether that failure is permanent remains to be seen.

Yet if you look at the map below, you can see that, with radical Islamists in charge of both Sudan and Northern Nigeria, the way is clear for a pan-Africa Islamist alliance stretching from the Red Sea to the Gulf of Guinea and the South Atlantic.

Both Sudan and Nigeria are oil-rich countries. No one seems to see where this is trending. Obama wants the US out of Iraq, the British appetite for action seems to be determined by the likes of Matthew Parris and the BBC. All the time vital resources are coming more and more under the power of hostile entities who are essential to the interests of China, and potential allies of Russia (which is in turn vital to Europe's energy requirements).

Oh, and the economies of the West are showing ever greater fragility.

2008-02-01T06:49:00.000Z

Blogger in spirit.

Students, "on the sudden transported under another climate to be tost and turmoil'd with their unballasted wits in fadomless and unquiet deeps of controversie, do for the most part grow into hatred and contempt of Learning, mockt and deluded all this while with ragged Notions and Babblements, while they expected worthy and delightful knowledge; till poverty or youthful years call them importunately their several wayes and hasten them with the sway of friends either to an ambitious and mercenary, or ignorantly zealous Divinity; Some allur'd to the trade of Law, grounding their purposes not on the prudent and heavenly contemplation of justice and equity which was never taught them, but on the promising and pleasing thoughts of litigious terms, fat contentions, and flowing fees; others betake them to State affairs, with souls so unprincipl'd in vertue, and true generous breeding, that flattery, and Court shifts and tyrannous Aphorisms appear to them the highest points of wisdom; instilling their barren hearts with a conscientious slavery, if, as I rather think, it be not fain'd. Others lastly of a more delicious and airie spirit, retire themselves knowing no better, to the enjoyments of ease and luxury, living out their daies in feast and jollity; which indeed is the wisest and the safest course of all these, unless they were with more integrity undertaken. And these are the fruits of mispending our prime youth at the Schools and Universities as we do, either in learning meer words or such things chiefly, as were better unlearnt."

I wonder what Milton would have made of universal education or 50% university attendance? Probably in this context he would have welcomed the healthy appearance of the Mcdegree. Milton's full text and commentary here.

2008-01-30T21:28:00.000Z

Our BBC boys go large

Recently there's been some hoohah over the BBC's funding from the EIB. EU Referendum blog has been on this case for almost four years, as have I, and I think there's a very broad picture here to talk about.

The Huntsman has a detailed analysis of the EIB case.

Surprisingly few people are aware that the BBC World Service is funded directly by the UK Government, not from the License Fee. Think of all those tie ins of expertise and knowledge between the BBC and the Foreign Office. This World Service is growing, not contracting, and its support from the Government is growing too. Lately they launched Arabic and Farsi TV, for instance, through a greatly enhanced funding package. The propagandist possibilities are endless, and they feed back into a BBC "we know best, we're the experts and know secrets" mentality that places them above their real direct funders, the public.

The BBC has not only received loans from the EU banking tool the EIB, it has also received direct funding from the EU.

That doesn't stop the BBC acting as a commercial operation at every opportunity. Its profits are its own, its liabilities are ours through the funding of all sorts with which taxpayers support it. When they're getting away with so much, why wouldn't they be arrogant?

One can rightly say that Conservatives have failed to see the BBC for what it is- a fundamentally unconservative concept and operation. This hydra head of state communications badly needs cutting back.

2008-01-25T19:57:00.000Z

Self-preservational cynicism

I read with interest the latest UK crime figures, and noticed that gun crime was up by four percent, while overall crime fell by nine percent.

I am aware of the existence of the British Crime Survey of public opinion, which acts as a counterweight to the statistical approach, but all things considered I find myself still sceptical.

It's interesting to me that the crime figures would go down when the "enforcement" mechanism of serious crime and organised crime, guns, should be on the rise.

I also wonder, because in the UK I had some experience with crime (on many occasions). There was especially one occasion when, living in York, my car was broken into- nothing was stolen, but many hundred of pounds of damage was caused. All I received was a written invitation to visit the local station and report the details along with parts of the car that had been the focus of the attack and were possibly forensically interesting. No police officer came out, and as I couldn't use my car I would have been forced to walk three miles to the station- if I could have been bothered- with a plastic bag full of bits I had no knowledge of how to treat to enable their effective use in the investigation (ha!). Being young I was supposed to be able to take, you know, whatever. I don't think the crime was ever recorded. Or maybe it was- I don't remember, know or care. It was just a very bad dream to be carless in that location for about six weeks as complex repairs took place.

Well, that wasn't my only experience, but it had a deadening effect on my perceptions. You see, crime tends to intimidate- one is so preoccupied with the most serious that others almost go unnoticed. Crime committed to property, for instance, or crime you witness. You're only bothered about the minor disaster that effects you. I don't think the authorities ever face up to that kind of reality- it's frankly far too much work. And so it goes, always worse, unheralded except in spasms of taboid righteousness.

And this brings me to the point about gun crime. It's so serious it has to be noticed; it's so intimidating it's all absorbing, but the thing is that it swallows up in its maw such a miserable array of crime- that's the point; guns shield crime. It's what they're for- at least when guns themselves are criminal.

2008-01-23T20:54:00.000Z

Seriously worrying, but good writing.

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard has a startlingly good analysis in the Telegraph of the financial crisis hitting world markets. Bottom line: the Fed did not panic.

2008-01-22T20:06:00.000Z

A very short post

"Today I have withdrawn my candidacy for President of the United States. I hope that my country and my party have benefited from our having made this effort. Jeri and I will always be grateful for the encouragement and friendship of so many wonderful people."

Right, said Fred, I'm off. You have to love the simplicity of it.

2008-01-21T20:14:00.000Z

Well, Fred came third in North Carolina, second among registered Republicans. A creditable performance but probably not enough. Still, if creditable is credit-worthy then I feel in credit, especially reading this.

Just as well, considering the parlous economic state out there.

2008-01-19T16:23:00.000Z

I Hate Writing Things Like This But Anyway...

GO FRED!

I have been observing the US Republican Primary race with quite some attention for a while now. Recently Thompson has been awesomely good, in the sense of the best a person can be when they don't believe "awesome" belongs in politics. Slap downs and humour, serious debate and moments of humanity outstripping in all modesty the rest. Very good indeed. But most people think it won't be enough. Romney would do, I suppose.

Sample recent Fredism:

"I'm opposed to global warming... I was up in New Hampshire a little while back for a debate - that's the only reason we went, because the circus was in town... and while we're on our way, there was a snowdrift that must have been six feet high... on this snowbank, there were about 15 signs stuck in that said, "STOP GLOBAL WARMING." They don't see any irony in things like that in New Hampshire."

There's no question we're going through warming and we need to understand it more... But we don't have the answers to a lot of questions. We don't know if this is the end o the story, or something that will be followed by cooling... If we shut down our entire economy, it still wouldn't do anything about what's coming from India and China... We are a small part of the solution, and we don't even know the extent of the problem yet."

A video of Fred taking the media down another peg here

Not stellar, but brilliant. That is the point of Fred.

Or hows about this?

2008-01-16T05:29:00.000Z

"We want to take our coverage of Westminster, the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly, the Northern Ireland Assembly, the European Parliament, as well as local councils up and down the land and turn them into the most engaging, the most creative multimedia portal for democracy in the world... all of it available to every secondary school in the UK as part of a strengthened commitment by BBC Learning to supporting citizenship and modern media literacy." (Mark Thompson, Director-General of Auntie)

What a turn off. Deeply scary. Speech here. The Times here. Mr Dale here.

2008-01-10T21:42:00.000Z

"I think little of people who will deny their history because it doesn't present the picture they would like."

Quote of the week.

2008-01-05T21:53:00.000Z

A List

Usually quite boring, lists can be useful for ordering information when that information is quite diffuse. Er, yes, well...

anyway, the Times have come up with a list of interest to me, mainly because this site's favourite poet, Philip Larkin, is placed at number one in their rankings of finest British postwar writers.

It's quite surprising- I thought I was quite unusual for placing him there but I think that he's one of these characters whose persona was so miserable people want to posthumously recognise him as a kind of exculpation of neglect. It helps that he happens to be transparently good.

What's so good about Larkin? David Baddiel writes a nice account.

Looking at the list, I am struck by its thinness- I feel that Ted Hughes at number four must be there to save the blushes of those of us who had to spend months, years, nay, decades, aeons, perusing his hamfisted countryside ramblings. Nice for kids... ah- but actually not, since his worldview is much more darwinian-dark than Larkin's ever was. Then there are the novelists, and with William Golding at number three one feels something like despair. And that's where Larking comes in, as quoted by Baddiel:

"If I seem good it’s because everyone else is so bad. Well, almost everyone. Well, anyway ..."

well, exactly Philip.

2008-01-02T10:23:00.000Z

Onwards and Upwards.

Progress: "misinterpreting the weather is getting easier and easier."

2008-01-01T17:24:00.000Z

That UK Janus face again

Complicated country, Britain.

As we enter a new year, Mark Steyn picks up two stories which show the two sides of Britain:

The NHS worshipping side, and the martially soaring spirit.

See, what we need is to divert a little of the latter to rip into the former, and then we'd be kicking, so to speak.

2008-01-01T16:37:00.000Z

An amusing Beeb-based opening to 08

Sometimes the deference shown by the BBC to the statements of the so-called authorities of questionable nations can be hilarious. Sometimes it's just foolish and unfair, since the Beeb can be so critical of western governments with whom they wish to pick a bone- for example the US.

Well I think in this case it's the former.

"Malaysian Health Minister Chua Soi Lek has admitted that he is the man who features in two widely circulated DVDs of an unmarried couple having sex.", runs the lede (italics and emboldening mine).

Later we learn "his own wife and children had accepted his apology.". So what was the point of the "unmarried couple" thing? He's married, alright, so why the tricksy little moralistic-sounding intro? Or is that just to help me with my google search- ahem, not that I would, of course (~~and anyway it doesn't seem to produce anything~~)

I dunno. It does get funnier though, when they quote:

"I am the man in the tape," Mr Chua, 60, told reporters.

"The girl is a personal friend."

Mmm. Certainly what I call a personal friend.

2007-12-27T19:23:00.000Z

'she was everything we in the west would like a Muslim leader to be. We should be modest enough to acknowledge when reality conflicts with our illusions. Rest in peace, Benazir.'

Mark Steyn says it so well.

I was thinking today about the distinction between fairytale and fantasy. Benazir Bhutto facing down the Islamists falls firmly into the latter category, if one remembers that fairytales contain a germ of human reality (the princess coming to her senses, the Prince ordering the garden, cutting down the undergrowth, seeing through the charade and inviting the modest girl to the dance, etc.- symbols of real action and change), fantasy drops from the sky.

One should give up on fantasies, but not fairytale. I've been sitting with my neice and nephew, watching such things- and now I'm following the Bhutto trauma online. Fairytales cannot lead anywhere but up or they peter out into fluffiness; fantasies can distort into nightmares, and almost always do.

2007-12-23T11:06:00.000Z

Still freely mocking politicians....

Mark Steyn's stocking filler is a corker.

Best read in accompaniment to this video 'enhancement' of Hillary's latest campaign video.

As the US election cycle begins to hot up, I was struck with the contrast between that and the incredibly depressing spectacle of another generation of Lib Dems girding their loins to rally behind the miserable, vapid and vacuous Nick Clegg, whose acceptance speech was empty as hell and inept even at that. The BBC tried to find an interesting angle on Clegg and as the Beeb were trying to be interesting in the written word, something they have limited understanding of, the result was typically grotesque:

"The male clegg drinks nectar, and sucks blood.

It's is an old word for a gadfly - an insect which hops from one thing to another, irritating livestock and rarely settling in one place.

Nick Clegg, its namesake, will hope there is more political sweetness than bleeding ahead."

I think I'd be a little irritated by that, were I a Lib-Dem, if I didn't know that it was probably just BBC "creativity" gone wrong- which is rather different from their groupthink leftism as that tends to follow predictable lines.

2007-12-15T12:29:00.000Z

Being busy without reason is a public menace.

In a week when the BBC have been trumpeting what they see and highlight as the latest evidence that global warming is fact (and of course, they always include the man-made hypothesis in this as though it were necessary to add it when it is implicit in the very presence of "Global Warming" stories in our societies' dailies), it's a relief to find Stephen Fry put his support for the movement in a philosphical context, reframing Pascal's Wager about God's existence:

"For the eco-believer it’s no-lose situation: we all survive if they’re right and we’ve acted on their belief, we survive if they’re wrong and we’ve acted on their belief. Whereas for the eco-denier we survive if they’re right and we’ve done nothing but we perish if they’re wrong and we’ve done nothing."

So often we get pointless and rebuttable anecdote- here we get a theory of action.

It's good to be able to say that Fry's thought is quite inadequate on this matter.

It's clear that there is not one accepted result of ignoring global warming. There are many, and few of them catastrophic in the short term save to a small minority of the world's population. Yes, that does sound rather Benthamite, doesn't it? Well, the eco-enthusiasts are the real Benthamites, it seems to me. They figure that focussing the world's economic, scientific and political resources on one aspect most prominent to themselves and their interests has and will have no consequences to those falling outside the sphere of action envisaged by the protocols of rich nations.

And if it does, well, tough. IT'S THE ONLY WAY. Win-Win :-).

Update: I've just come across this rather excellent post from Sean Gabb of the Libertarian alliance on the subject.

2007-12-14T12:36:00.000Z

Amazing, isn't it, how much ground the solidly conservative Thompson can make up, just by ambling along?

Interesting article, with the opinions of ace pollster Frank Luntz, here.

Fred is the man as far as my thoughts go on the US Presidential trail. I still think he'll be the winner. It's funny that it's so much more encouraging (with caveats) to follow US politics than it is to follow the UK's.

2007-12-09T17:34:00.000Z

It becomes wearisome

No I've not tired of blogging in the few days since I got my laptop back from the ~~cowboys~~ technicians who fixed it.

No, the wearisome thing is the extent to which writers with whom I am in agreement are suffering from the scrutiny of the law.

I mentioned Susan Ehrenfeld a while back- a lady who cannot publish in or visit the UK after being landed with a GBP250,000 libel order from a British judge. Ehrenfeld was just among the most vocal in a line of victims of Islamic ~~terrorist conduit~~ ~~sewer~~ suer-in-chief, Khalid bin Mahfouz.

As I mentioned below, Mark Steyn is now in the line of fire, predictably- through his Canadian publishers Macleans. I've had a read of the muslim lawyers' complaints document and they are predictably lacking in substance and long on generalities- but perhaps the law relating to "Islamophobia" is too.

Stanley Kurtz makes a valid point when he says "the anti-free-speech attacks on Steyn and Maclean’s, by Western-trained lawyers, no less, show that Steyn’s concerns about poorly assimilated Western values are more than justified."

The only problem with that is that it isn't Steyn's viewpoint- he sees such lawyers as understanding all too well the lessons of their education. I think he's right. Arguing in generalities laced with a vague scent of human rights is about the level of public discourse, and I would say not so far from the standard of legal discourse, today. The whole incitement of religious hatred thing is a vague nonsense open to abuse from day one- and so it is proving.

2007-12-06T06:12:00.000Z

Of course he can

First they came for... well, whatever- Mark Steyn outlines how the Canadian Islamic thingamy association is out to censure him and his book America Alone (Christmas last year spent being ill was better for this book). A bit late for the Islamofreaks, I'd have thought, but Steyn responds:
"I can defend myself if I have to. But I shouldn’t have to."
Well, quite. As far as I can remember he only referred to limb chopping backward looking wife beating honour-killing muslims as being in the minority, and the rest failing to condemn. What's to challenge about that characterisation?

2007-11-29T16:19:00.000Z

Back Soon.

I know you'll be excited to read this, those who do that is, but actually vital signs are reported to have returned to my laptop and some serious surfing may resume in the next few days. Hope so. I've noticed a certain Gordon Brown appearing regularly in the side columns of local newspapers, and if I understand rightly he's in a bit of bother. Which would be fun, if it weren't serious.

2007-10-25T07:42:00.000Z

Accidents and...

The first point of this post is to explain that my laptop had an unfortunate accident last weekend, for which a remedy is being sought. For the moment, Ed's laptop is unwell...

The second (and main point), is to register my surprise at this news from Jamaica at the inquest of Bob Woolmer- surprise that the original pathologist is insisting that Woolmer's death was no accident. This would accord with my observation that there is much to be suspicious of in the Woolmer case. It is surprising he is allowed to be heard.

2007-10-21T16:48:00.000Z

Another brick in the wall

That's all the EU treaty is, in that it simply binds together previous treaties and makes more of them operative, plus creating the platform for the next layer of EU power grabs. Or so it seems to me.

It's a sad business trying to dissect the legalities because it's not what a concerned person, a subject of his own nation, ought to have to do. Legal personality. An overall EU foreign minister. Demotion of competition law. Promotion of social protection. These are all just soundbytes really, and it makes about as much sense summing them up neatly as it does to take a few swipes at a roomful of cobwebs.

The fundamental point is this: I and most other Britons of age to vote today have never had a chance to vote specifically on anything to do with the EU, let alone membership of its various incarnations. I did actually vote for James Goldsmith in the elections of 1997 (my first vote), but with a heavy heart- single issues are not what national elections are for.

Yet the EU is not a single issue, it's a multitude of issues rolled into one, and it has created a democratic deficit which no politicians seem to want to address, rather than manage.

Britain is essentially suffering from Europe's weakness. If Europe were strong then each nation would negotiate in a complex diplomatic nexus areas of agreement that could be flexible and joined or not depending on circumstances. Europe would be a dynamic place not fixated on 0.2% of economic growth here, -.3% there.

British people, when they think about politics, think about our politics. The EU is essentially irrelevant to their thinking but paradoxically determinative when it comes to their options. The people in Louisiana seem to be far more rationally focussed on politics than the British people (this story actually holds a lot of hope for peoples slumped for many years in paralysing political doldrums).

Yet that lack of focus is fundamentally not the British people's fault, but the myopia and supine laziness of their leaders- and their leaders' ignorance, as was interestingly pointed out by EU Ref.

If you think about the only issue of hot political debate in the UK over the last ten years, the only thing which turned situations in constituencies upside down, that would be the Iraq war. Key point: that was a British decision to support the US. It was a sovereign choice, right or wrong. One reason I think that such an issue was so hot was, I think, because the lazy Europhile underbelly of public opinion was suddenly shaken (wobbled?) by the notion of a British policy independent of the EU. Quel horror!

Well, Britain, not Europe as such, was attacked in the '05 bombings. Britain still exists, and the legal fraud of the EU will one day soon be brought to answer because of sheer hypocrisy. The EU's trading standards were clearly not being kept when the country was sold the project, and sold to the project, in one referendum before the lifetimes of me and many of my fellow voters.

2007-10-15T06:50:00.000Z

Lubos Motl is scathing about the Goracle's coronation by the Nobels.

What galls me is that the UK seems to have run out of appetite for good old-fashioned (and trustworthy) anti-American stereotypes, just when one of them could be usefully applied.

The British Government now thinks it's a laugh to sell snake oil to school children, after sober reflection of course.

2007-10-13T17:50:00.000Z

More than irritating.

Awarding the Nobel peace prize to Al Gore was an act of political hostility, ironically. Personally I hate such backslapping affairs and would rather recognition were spontaneous- in which case the moronically inclined could whoop it up for Al all by their ownsome. It's the astonishing lack of attention given to their detractors which makes the Nobel committee's decisions so much like a kind of open suicide note to history. Recognise Carter, Annan, Gore, and you're pinning your colours to the mast and inviting a reprisal through public opinion. But so what?

Guess which British broadcaster was busy doing some loud whooping? Yup, that one. Another group whose demise would have me saying, "so what?".

Al Gore seems to think, by the way, that Hillary is unstoppable for 08.

It's true she's been a well-oiled machine of late. However, her almost preternaturally attractive image (seen above) is a bit of a Dorian Gray- someone's bound to find the real picture over time. She's clearly got image consultants that "silky" Edwards would die for- she's just not that attractive and powerful-looking, never has been, and truthfully the falseness there is indicative of her wider flaws: a skin-deep philosophy hiding a neurotic desperation for power.

People will prefer Fred, who is my tip for '08.

And that's the real danger for our Norwegian friends and the Rev. Al Gore as well- vanity will out in the end. Can't wait.

2007-10-12T14:39:00.001Z

Champion of the blogosphere

No, not Al Gore, who only invented the internet. Damien Thompson, who lays into the old fraud here.

Comment of the day though comes from John B:

"Well, that proves it. The Nobel peace committee is entirely predictable, unlike the earth's climate."

2007-10-12T14:23:00.000Z

Reason: from Ayaan Hirsi Ali

"reason dictates that you can only progress when you can analyze the circumstances and act accordingly"

2007-10-12T04:35:00.000Z

Lovely little essay on ConHome by Louise Bagshawe about Gordon and the Conservatives.

We have contributed to Brown’s “Ratner moment” – one week when he totally trashed the careful image he’s built up over ten years, and showed the nation he’s a spinning (Iraq), bottling (Andrew Marr), bogus (“the polls had nothing to do with it”) bog-standard new Labour apparatchik.

One question: wasn't "Gordon Brown" (as we knew him) in fact a figment of Tony Blair's imagination?

2007-10-11T12:51:00.000Z

Interesting things noted.

I have noticed recently some action on the Pakistan front. Not the Afghan one, the cricket one. First the retirement of Inzamam ul Haq, the captain. He is 37, apparently, so that's not surprising in a way. Then the banning of Shoab Akhtar for 13 games for allegedly hitting a colleague with a bat.

Two of the most senior players gone in a matter of weeks.

Well, it's been around six months since the death of Bob Woolmer, in circumstances we were assured afterwards - long afterwards - were not suspicious.

Apparently Shoaib hit his fellow player Mohammed Asif on the thigh. Interesting- it's difficult to call that a serious act, since being hit there is not very dangerous and actually not so unusual in the ordinary course of cricket when fielding close to the bat. It's often worse then because the batsman is actually trying to wallop the ball and instead hits the close-in fielder- ouch!

13 games is an awful lot, but then Shoaib is a bit of a bad boy. He has had brushes with drugs for which he was banned for 2 years and then soon after reprieved, and was actually replaced in the Pakistani team just before the World Cup where Pakistan lost to Ireland and Woolmer died.

Shoaib was fined in January for a row with Woolmer. A fight between them had previously been denied.

Btw, in looking into this situation I found out that before he died, Woolmer had started a blog. In it he notes, shortly before the World Cup began "We also hear with pleasure that Sami and Yasir Arafat will replace Shoaib and Asif." With pleasure?

Shoaib is currently being disciplined for hitting Asif, it appears- both men restored to the Pakistani dressing room only to fall out, it would seem. Asif had also- like Shoaib- been found guilty of using the drug nandrolone, and his withdrawal from the Pakistan world cup team was rumoured to be about more than just an injury.

Ah, dressing room politics. It seems that there was just an extraordinary amount of that going on in the Pakistani one prior and subsequent to the death of the cricket coach.

2007-10-08T11:56:00.000Z

Gordon Morphs

It's really very funny watching Brown trying to imitate Tony Blair in his press conference today. He even dropped a 't' just now- "wha' I want to do" is show my vision etc etc.

Another thing noticed in Gordon Brown's recent presentations: the number of times he mentions some variation of "honest". Blair was master at doing that without over-egging it- managing to plead without ever descending into desperation, pleading before people saw it as necessary and thereby coming off as "sincere".

What is clear is that Brown, having sat back and observed Blair all those years, now does a pretty passable impression of Blair with some vital aspects missing, and some very Brownish tics visible.

Much better when talking about figures than about politics.

2007-10-06T20:21:00.000Z

Tony Blair is cleverer than Gordon Brown...

It's the answer to a question I've thought about a bit over the years. It's not something I take great joy in finding out for sure, and neither does it prove that Tony Blair was actually a "good thing" (really I don't think that at all). But the hamminess of that clunking fist is apparent in the chain of events that have unfolded, leading up to Brown's big anti-climax non-election announcement, while TB has pranced on, viralesque, into the Middle East.

As Boulton says "whatever else, it will call into question the judgement of Team Brown and also their sincerity when they talk about the national interest because of the political calculation which they have clearly now been caught by the headlights".

2007-10-04T19:50:00.000Z

You may or may not know this but... Ayaan Hirsi Ali is back in hiding in Holland.

Douglas Murray expresses the situation very clearly.

This is a lady whom I would be proud to volunteer to guard. Unchivalrous Holland thinks otherwise.

2007-10-02T20:49:00.000Z

Stop right there, Beeb.

"Ever the showman..."

Yes. The article is about Gordon Brown- the man who had to be taught to smile. The man who was once the sober son of the manse- prudence's best friend, you name it in terms of sobriety when he was covering Tony Blair's back in the nulab early years- is now a smiling showman. Truly the spin is dead- long live the sping!

2007-10-01T19:23:00.000Z

And then, quite a lot of news.

Well, some fascinating analysis of the latest numbers from Iraq- sadly we're talking body counts, but I've always been absolutely focussed on these as my means of understanding what can be understood about there by us from over here. John Wixted has the breakdown- keep scrolling, but notice where it compares the trends of sectarian Shia-led killings with Al Qaeda bombing attacks. The surge happens, and the former drop off, while the latter take off, and now appear to have stuttered. You can see a chink of light here, you really can- once the battle becomes Al Qaeda vs, the battle becomes worthwhile and meaningful and Iraqis suddenly begin to see their choices.

I was also very impressed by this article from Caroline Glick on the Ahmadinejad trip to the US. It's the fundamentals on fundamentalism, to put it succinctly.

And well, I even got a little excited by the Conservative Conference this week. On the other hand this guy brought me back down to earth. Some traps would be worth falling into- it's known as principle and far-sightedness. But, yes, it would be a turn up for the books if that happened to be the case with the current Conservatives.

2007-09-30T11:13:00.000Z

Serious Considerations...

Another week and, sorry, another gap in posting, wasn't there? It's not really a sign of my getting tired of the weblog, more a symptom of me re-thinking a few things and that it's not always possible to be thoughtful and prolific, especially when time is short and other things crowd in.

Something that caught my eye in this week of the Labour Party conference was the neat way in which the BBC gave Gordon Brown a platform on the international stage as he responded to the upheavals in Burma. Also included was a nice image of Brown looking like a man of fortitude.

So many of these positive images of Brown floating around at the moment, aren't there? Reminds me of a contempory of mine at school- a bit wimpy so he got into judo, which was fine until he got his photo in the local paper, captioned: "Nick, ready for action". Too much. I had to laugh. Not his fault, of course, but ott.

In the new, unelected Prime Minister's case it makes me sick because there are real people on the end of these conflicts, and all Gordon sees fit to do is to introduce an element of surprise into his Conference package by appearing to be at the forefront in a crisis. It's almost as if Gordon is saying that anything Blair can do (ie. spin), he can do better- and with more chutzpah, as is shown by the fact that he announced on his ascension an end to spin. Since then it's been nothing but spin and proven that his image is paramount.

As often I have to acknowledge a "thought debt" to Mark Steyn, whose latest article is in my view among his very best,

"So much of contemporary life is about opportunities for self-congratulation. Risk-free dissent is the default mode of our culture, and extremely seductive."

Yes, yes, and Gordon has been giving us a masterclass recently- as if we needed one. That's one reason we miss Steyn in the UK these days since he walked out of the Telegraph and Spectator. Brown trotted onto the centre stage, full of righteous indignation about affairs in a country that he'll never have to sacrifice anything for, the epitome of risk-free self-congratulation.

And that's not even to mention Darfur. Or the cuts in the Navy. It's all virtual, this world, apart from the people who're dying.

2007-09-23T18:53:00.000Z

Shhh- only me. Sorry I've haven't posted for a few days. I've been working on something a bit different.

As it is, I have only two slivers of Steyn brilliance to offer.

The king of wordplay was at his finest in 2002 when swapping barbs with the Saudi Ambassador to London: 'a couple of days later it was announced that King Fahd had appointed him Minister of Water - which, on closer inspection, turns out to mostly involve being Minister of Sewage. My fan has hit the s--t'

But then he's not so rusty today, though a touch more serious:

Last week freedom took another hit. Hillary Rodham Clinton unveiled her new health care plan. Unlike her old health care plan, which took longer to read than most cancers take to kill you, this one’s instant and painless – just a spoonful of government sugar to help the medicine go down. From now on, everyone in America will have to have health insurance.
Hooray!
And, if you don’t, it will be illegal for you to hold a job.

Read the rest for the statistical demolition job, and be illuminated.

2007-09-18T18:26:00.000Z

BBC's news draining away

Well it seems like that concerning Iraq. Of course they are still highlighting the negatives, such as the recent debacle of killings by Blackwater Security- which may or may not have been Blackwater's fault (too early to say).

It's not a safe thing to do to say that the BBC are running out of bad news on Iraq- they are resourceful for the lean times and so are the terrorists- but it certainly seems that they have little choice in the negative stories they cover ie. the selection is diminishing.

Have you heard about the quiet times for Baghdad's main hospital and mortuary? Thought not- at least not from the BBC.

Have you heard how Hell got pasted in Ramadi? Thought not- from the BBC anyway.

Have you heard how they are emulating the Anbar province in Southern Baghdad province? Well, you know the score by now. (I must confess an indebtedness to the great Instapundit that I know all about things the BBC haven't covered).

As I said, I really wouldn't want to claim that the BBC haven't got any bad news to report- I just think that perhaps they will have to cast an eye at the positive stuff if trend follows trend. I think the most remarkable thing, the thing that's really different in Iraq now, is the turnaround of the Sunni triangle. It's the dissolution of this terrible clot of blood that could release the pressure on the rest of the Iraqi body. Let's hope.

Still.

2007-09-17T09:36:00.000Z

Economic woes.

There is a list of things as long as your arm that could outline what Gordon Brown has done to bring the British economy to its current perilous pass. Of course, listing them here would require a little too much Googling for today... (If the state of Gordon-critiquing were better I am sure I would have them off the top of my head by now. (dis)Honourable mention here for the BBC for being such a good shill for Gordon over the years. It's what they do, you know).

The Telegraph notes, in an article typically headlined according to the personality involved, "The banking crisis of 1973 was one of the key factors that led to Mr Heath's government losing the 1974 election."

Mmm. 1973. Here we go again.

2007-09-13T18:21:00.000Z

Britain overspun

Today saw Mrs Thatcher visiting Downing Street, welcomed by Gordon Brown. Gordon has clearly learnt a few things from Tony Blair.

This convenient publicity gives Gordon the chance to wrong-foot the Conservatives, that much is clear. It also, I think, demonstrates that the repeated disloyalty of the Conservatives to the substance of the 80's transformation means that Mrs T. has no reason to side with them against Gordon.

Mrs Thatcher, it's true, was barely middle class in the context of Britain when she was growing up. Middle class for Grantham, yes, but that was a town well down the pecking order of desirable societies.

So if Mrs T. welcomes opportunities to have meetings with the marketising socialists, it's no real surprise. She isn't a Tory, like Cameron, after all.

But if she imagines that Tony Blair and Gordon Brown actually oversee a real continuation of her approach to society, she's quite misled (and anyway, we know there's no such thing as society). Not surprising, at her age.

One interesting indicator of Gordon Brown's approach came today as the UN adopted a treaty on "native rights". There was a very plain group of countries voting against- the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

Is it conceivable that under Margaret Thatcher Britain wouldn't have voted with them? Well, almost, but only as a tactic and a short term one at that.

It's not clear whether the UK might have abstained, and it is a non-binding agreement , but it's interesting to note that many countries who have at least as much to lose as the four who voted against the agreement must have voted for it. Countries in South America, for instance. Heaven knows what "indigenous peoples" might mean when applied to Europe.

And that's the thing- most of the countries that voted for the agreement would lose something were they to follow the rules they sign to- non-binding really just means that there will be no mechanism for enforcement. Thus it must be, either we have a lot of selfless neighbours in the world, or most have signed in blithe bad faith. The latter is my guess, which is why we need the anglosphere. Which is why it really means something when we ignore them. Which is why I say that the direction of this country is basically heading towards hunkering down in a hypocritical, two-faced, socialist Europe. That sucks, actually.

2007-09-12T19:31:00.000Z

The deeply impressive Petraeus

I managed to catch about 90 minutes of Gen. Petraeus' testimony to the Senate committee yesterday- I couldn't believe it when I heard them say how much there was left; those sessions are incredibly long.

One little glitch I noticed was his Bush-like slip where he talked of the terrorists' global war on terror- which of course should have been of terror.

I was interested by this short clip via HotAir of a bit I hadn't seen, later in the session, where he corrected that slip very pointedly.

That self-correction comes amid another self-correction- he is explaining how the war in Iraq is making America safer, having been non-committal on the point in answering an earlier question. It's easy to understand why he didn't answer immediately- is it a soldier's job to survey the whole world like some latter-day Alexander the Great? According to the Senate committee you would think so.

Yet Petraeus, like any army man, has a sense of territory. If you keep it, no-one else can except someone you permit to inherit it from you. That, strangely, is why in this non-state war it is so vital not to give up territory. It's because you wish to prevent a group of people who don't respect territorial sovereignty from getting their own territory, which they personally don't care for, which is for them merely a launch pad for infiltrating more territory, causing more chaos, increasing their power base, reach, influence and prestige.

Petraeus knows all that instinctively. Others need to learn it.

Oh, and btw, I think that what Petraeus is doing will make the UK a whole lot safer than it would otherwise be as well. Certainly winning in Iraq would have that effect, though any such judgement is a finely balanced one in the grand scheme of things.

2007-09-12T18:51:00.000Z

From not-always-quotable-Norm-

"what a lot of useless claptrap postmodernism is. For, while (as I've said) I don't know what the truth of this particular case is, one thing that's clear to everyone is that there is a truth about it: something really happened, an event took place involving Madeleine"

It's just common sense really. From an academic. Today. Talking about the Madeleine McCann case is something of a departure for me, and actually I am not going to do so here.

What happened to Madeleine was no doubt a very specific train of events which resulted in A) tragedy, and B) mystification. Any conclusions I could draw would be terribly politically incorrect and practically speaking indefensible. I do think however that our era is rich in the qualities that made Greek drama tick. I think that's a strong hint, actually.

2007-09-10T20:29:00.000Z

U.S. Can Do

I there's one thing I'd like the US to take away from recent Iraq experience as presented by General Petraeus, it would be that there's nothing they can't do in Iraq. That's not the same as saying they can impose order everywhere at will- it's that whole regions can be tamed when the US is concerted in its approach. More than anything, when it shows that it just won't back down.

Here's a nice graphic from Petraeus' presentation:

(click to enlarge. More graphics here)

You can see the rising tide of violence, a slow wave rising in various particulars of violence, interrupted and brought back to levels that indicate one thing- respite. The product of the so-called "surge".

It's interesting to me, because it not only confirms that commitment brings success, but also that I was right in thinking that the violence had been on a gradual but steepening incline from the end of 04 (with a small break after the Iraqi general election- were some of the Islamofascists holding their breath, waiting to see if...?).

If you couple it with stories like this one from Michael Yon, it begins to look as though commitment wins success, fighting works, and Iraq is no quagmire- though it's the kind of unruly beast that requires constant discipline mixed with reassurance.

It's not a great deal of information, admittedly, but it's of a lot more value than the latest BBC-Iraq poll. The complexities of such an undertaking when asking detailed questions according to western priorities ought to be obvious. I wonder what the Arabic for "surge" is?