Couple of items.

Following up yesterday's post, this TechCentral article struck me as interesting- talking about how to deal with the militaristic character of some Mosques and their authorities. (via Glenn)

Meanwhile, I found it most amusing when the nice doggie gave Caroline a nip on the backside -thanks to Max.

Also- this was the first time I really appreciated an Anne Coulter article. I've just never been drawn in- until she was a reject. Now I get it.

Beeb to Dems: 'We'll start your bandwagon'.

Well, they'll do what they can anyway.

After all, with Kerry sagging in the polls, it's up to the troopers at the BBC to point out that 'Respondents said they did not know enough about Mr Kerry's policies.'

When it comes to Kerry's supporting cast, such as Terese, the Beeb's supportiveness can be relied on:

'She has caused further embarrassment with an interview conducted in the 1970s, unearthed by her enemies, in which she said she did not trust Edward Kennedy, now her husband's chief backer, our correspondent says.'

Those pesky 'enemies', grubbing around in the dirt of history for irrelevant details when they could be doing something more useful, like investigating Bush's service record.

Alternatively, the supportiveness might merely mean euphemising awkward facts, such as this about Terese Heinz-Kerry:

'she is not the easiest person to sell to middle America'

Elsewhere we find the BBC on form (check the positive adjective count on this puff-piece for Clinton) with unattributed statements like the following:

'The Republicans and President George W Bush favour concentrated wealth and power, more unilateral action, pursuing a vision that is "far to the right of most Americans." '

or suggesting that the Republicans are really the nasty party:

'the Republican Party machinery continued working flat out to try to counter their opponents' message.'-

for which you might be anticipating some supporting evidence, but no.

Or, and this is my favourite circumlocution, trying to find a way of making Kerry seem a decent candidate while still praising his running mate Edwards:

'The senator for North Carolina is considered a charismatic speaker.

He is seen as a good vice-presidential choice for Mr Kerry, who has sometimes been considered as lacking in that department, correspondents say.' (heh- emboldenings and italics mine)

All in all a few good days shilling, I'd say.

Know Thy Enemy: Al Quaradhawi speaks (again).

Well, we all knew he was an Jew hater for the hell of it- though I didn't receive a response from my email to the BBC where I observed they were softening Al-Qaradhawi's ideology for public consumption- but he goes about confirming that in this Memri translation of an Arabic newspaper analyis of comments from his regular broadcast on Al-Jazeera.

'The iniquity of the Jews, as a community, is obvious and apparent. Let me explain: The West, I can say about some of them [i.e., Westerners] who are iniquitous, and others who are not iniquitous. And it is possible. But iniquity on the part of the Jews is great iniquity, grave iniquity, iniquity that is incomparable and overt. Therefore, when it was suggested to me that Jews would be participating in the dialogue in the upcoming interview, I rejected this. I said no, we should not conduct a dialogue with these [people] while their hands are stained with our blood.'

Now, such is my Dhimmi mindset I'm almost inclined to gratitude that Al Qaradhawi saw fit to say that some of us westerners are 'not iniquitous', and that his objection to the Jews relates to their "hands... stained with... blood"- implying an act they could atone for- but no, I'm actually not grateful to this bloody idealogue for anything at all.

As the Iraqi emigre writer Hassan Assad puts it neatly in a must-read feature about Red Ken and Al-Qaradhawi from the same Memri report, 'he dissimulates'.

In the case of the passage above it is necessary to unpack a bit of Al-Qaradhawi's religious perspective. But first, I observe that Jewish iniquity is 'incomparable' with Western iniquity- when you might have thought that because Muslims have been killed in Afghanistan and even the holiest of Iraqi cities by US and other invading Western troops the Jews ought not to be so different. This is because Islam agrees with the other two faiths that the Jews were specially favoured by God- after all, Abraham and Moses etc. were Jews. Islam also believes that Jesus was just a man and not the son of God- so the Christian led/based Westerners are barking up the wrong tree, as dogs are inclined to do I suppose. The point is that the Westerners/Christians are misled, the Jews rebellious, and rebellion is qualitatively worse than foolishness, so Jewish iniquity is 'incomparable'.

For Al-Qaradhawi, the Jews in occupying the Muslim land without being Muslims is where they are delighting in their rebellion, and the blood of Muslims seals that iniquity- hence he is implacable.

That's where the religious outlook and the political ideology of Al-Qaradhawi and his many followers are united.

Memri, incidentally, noticed how the BBC's coverage of Al Qaradhawi promulgated his line nicely for him as well:

'According to the BBC, he is reported to have said, "Do these people know me? If they are really after the truth why don't they try and find it instead of this venomous media campaign?" '

*

Tim Blair meanwhile has picked up on another alliance between Islamic dogma and the far left from his perennial bete noir Margo Kingston. Many comments follow after Margo's little slip:

"the fundamentalist Zionist lobby controls politics and the media in the US and Australia"

Just one of those phrases that slips out occasionally by accident, I'm sure.

The (Un)conservative enemy:

This is a Beeb-bash-based blog, and it is so because the values of the BBC- self-vaunting, coercive, politically correct- are so much to my mind the kernel of what is wrong, and what could get worse, with the media that shapes our society- and it's good to say so!

The Beeb though is only a part of the problem with the media; a vital part, but just a part.

That's why I am so impressed by this profound entry in Melanie Phillips' diary. She carves through the morasse of contradictory, vacuous opinion and in the process really sorts out some of the opinionati.

One of the targets (the main one) is Andrew Sullivan, whose latest article for the Times is a model of weasiliness.

I so wanted to write to Sullivan to say what I thought of his decision to back Kerry after spouting a whole lot of songs from the Bush song-book for the last four years, but I backed out when the message was written because it seemed mean-spirited. It was accurate, and not cruel, but it didn't sound nice. Melanie manages to nail him nicely:

'Sullivan is all over the place on the war: a faint-heart who, while ostensibly still supporting it, has nevertheless succumbed to the absurd and irrational propaganda of the anti-war mob.'

She rightly points out his complacency, and I could scarcely believe my eyes when I read Sullivan's opinion that

'Nobody seriously believes that Bush will start another war.'

With these words Sullivan proclaims what is utterly contrary to his stated views: it was GWB's war, not Saddam's. How can a person be in favour of war per se unless they are tyrannical? I mean, pick your cause for war with Saddam- breaking sanctions, supporting terrorists, transgressing resolutions, never completing his original surrender from his previous aggression etc etc- but don't say the war originated with GWB unless you have only personal emnity against him.

When I hear, as probably I will from Sullivan himself or his new democratic friends, how a torrent of vitriol has poured down on his head because of this principled stand- I'll perhaps re-read Melanie's argument and be safe in the knowledge that the central criticisms are powerful and don't rely on offensive name-calling. Still, I anticipate finding him doing a camp impression of Ali G.; something like 'Is is because I is gay?', in the not-too-distant future.

It's Sunday, and since for a considerable portion of the world this is a day of reflection, it seems appropriate that Archbishop Rowan Williams has made a spiritual statement in accepting an invitation to mark Sept. 11th this year by speaking to an Islamic University in Cairo- an institution that has made many a controversial entry at LGF.

Whether he will be praising Islam as the report says I am not sure, but I bet that he will try (futilely) to ingratiate himself with the religion of suicide bombers. I also bet that the BBC, if they report his speech, will say he delivered a 'tough' message- I'd lay a tenner that exact word will be used- 'challenging' Islam to remain 'true' to its 'essential principles', principles shared by all 'people of faith'.

Just a guess of course.

A little something about 'scare-quotes'. (also posted, in very similar form, at B-BBC)

Just an observation really. Much annoyance is created by the BBC's often suggestive, often hamfisted use of 'scare-quotes'- which as the name implies appear intended to shove a certain interpretation of a story forcefully at the reader.

I noticed,Drudge and the BBC headlining the same story of the discovery of some of GWB's military service payroll records. Drudge put it "Bush 'destroyed' Military records found". The BBC put it "Bush 1972 payroll records 'found'".

Drudge was right, the BBC (typically) wrong- and suggestive. You see, what is called into question by the finding of these records? Obviously it is the original statement that they were destroyed- that statement now looks a bit fishy. What is beyond doubt is that they have been found.

What these scare-quotes do is suggest that the Bush campaign have somehow been hiding them all the long, just waiting for the right moment to reveal them. It's an act of interpretation that radically restricts my freedom to interpret- precisely because it's not true and the only application must be ironic.

I wrote to the BBC earlier on and said I had one word in response to their choice to showcase this story (and I spared them the detail but I suppose I really meant 'in that manner'): Berger. The story of Sandy Berger, pants-stuffing or sock-stuffing, whichever or both, was of course nowhere to be seen by this time, but I have to say I am more suspicious of the BBC's choice to highlight this Bush story than I am entertaining of the idea that Bush (or Rove) incubated these documents until the media was ripe to hatch them. Thus, for me, is the BBC politicised and untrustworthy.

And, in case that seems an overreaction, this is how the Democrats responded:

'The supposed discovery of these records on Friday afternoon, as reporters converge on Boston to cover the Democratic National Convention, is highly questionable...

What this little tale suggests is a)the BBC's intense interest in the outcome of this coming Presidential election, and b) Their inability or unwillingness to see what is necessary for impartiality in the US political context.

An irony has struck me:

It seems that terrorists in Iraq have been trying to define for us confused westerners just what an 'operational relationship' is by abducting an Egyptian diplomat in Baghdad. Apparently in merely 'offering security aid' to Iraq the Egyptian government have crossed over the line and become the enemies of Jihad. Merely an 'offer' was good enough for the terrorists to go sharpening their daggers- 'Egyptian Egyptian officials have stressed that no deal was struck'. It's a useful lesson in how to define one's enemies in this war on terror.

Profuse apologies and a sincere mea culpa to any who may've emailed me over the last number of weeks using the email address edev.66@virgin.net. I have been unable to access it due to technical difficulties which I hoped to be able to sort out but haven't. Anyway, I have a new address- ed@edthomas.wanadoo.co.uk- and I promise not to let this happen again.

It's worth stating the obvious sometimes: somehow the media with their lofty perspective fail to.

As Melanie Phillips points out in her appreciation of Charles Krauthammer's analysis regarding the 9/11 commission, bin Laden could certainly swing both ways of the poisonous Sunni-Shia divide.

But, taking the reports of Iranian assistance to Al Qaeda, which amounts partly to them having allowed transit to the Sept 11 bombers, it's worth just ruminating over a portion of the geopolitical reality- something that really should have been a bigger part of our understanding of Iraq. With anti-war people it's as though because geopolitical circumstances are bigger than any conspiracy or plot (I won't mention the 'H' word, but there it is), they don't have any significance.

So, take Iran (map), a country which borders the former Soviet republics, Turkey and Pakistan, as well as Iraq and Afghanistan- not to mention its long coastline along the Persian gulf opposite the Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Oman, that opens out into the expanse of the Arabian sea (I write with a map open in front of me):

All I would point out is that the Al Qaeda terrorists had only two other real choices of countries to transit- assuming that they didn't want to stick out in leaving Afghanistan (map) by air- which were Pakistan or the former Soviet republics. Of these, Pakistan had relations with the US at the highest levels (these reached a crunch after Sept 11, but Pakistan's top levels could be described as broadly soft towards the West)- and Putin no doubt had intelligence tentacles a'plenty in the 'istans. Iran therefore makes perfect sense so far as transiting terrorists are concerned- which is not to mention Iran's radical Islam/pariah state status which seems a helpful circumstance too.

The other thing I would say is that for the enemies of GWB, proving him wrong over Iraq and therefore unfit to continue in his job after November is much more important than being right over Iran- since as Melanie points out they wouldn't be for confronting Iran anyway.

Hey, I said it was going to be obvious.

Couple of Nuggets.

Tim Blair names and shames the countries (the many countries) that condemned Israel's barrier in a UN vote. They include Britain, most shamefully as far as I am concerned. I think the Israeli courts were doing their business well and that Israel's right to self-protection should be paramount- as it reduces the need for self-defence.

I do hope Britain's vote had nothing to do with the common foreign policy of the EU, which the Beeb's Paul Reynolds said 'will not force the nation states to adopt a common policy on issues like Iraq.'. The operative word, I think, is 'force'. (incidentally, this is an article I'm going to fisk in the near future- it's pathetic)

*

This is interesting- a case where a British engineering company (already fingered by media reports on Oil-for-Food) admits that it may have received four million pounds beyond its normal commission payments from Iraq through the Oil-for-Food programme- and it doesn't know where the money went afterwards. Interestingly the market didn't like it and shares in Weir fell 3%. Of course it's only one case, but being British they are owning up to it. What about the rest? (via Friends of Saddam)

*

Oh, something else. Via Memri, the translation of an interview given by the Iraqi defence minister I mentioned recently. It accuses... yes, Iran, of substantial levels of infiltration into Iraq. I've already pointed out the BBC's reluctance to notice this.

Key Findings- What Are They?

As if to illustrate my point below, the BBC's list of 'key findings' from the 9/11 Commission is instructive for the one, final, crucial point they make below the 'How It Happened' subheading.

This is that 'There was no operational link between al-Qaeda and ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.'

I think this would surely be better put in terms that they had not uncovered an operation on which Al Qaeda had cooperated with Saddam (and to the pernickety it's also intriguing that it is put so starkly in relation to 'Saddam'. Do they mean that at the lower reaches of Saddam's regime there may have been such collaboration?). Certainly there ought to be another 'key point' in the BBC report, in fact there should be several, according to this report:

a)'The report... said Iraq had sporadic contacts with bin Laden's group in the years before the airborne assault on the World Trade Centre and Pentagon that left nearly 3000 people dead.'

and

b)'The panel's final report added a tantalising qualifier to a staff document last month that found no "collaborative relationship," suggesting at one point that Iraq may have offered to harbor al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.'

At last! A definition of 'collaboration' that makes sense of all the equivocating about Iraq's ties with Al Qaeda: to 'collaborate' you not only have to offer to harbour the leader of Al Qaeda, he has to accept too.

From the interesting Eursoc: a summary of why all media should wear warning tags, not just the allegedly wacky ones who scare the life out of the moribund monoliths of the uber-media. They point out quite rightly that the established media's 'deep-set bias' has, for example, skewered the debate about the war in Iraq.

I think it's high time we got post-modern about this and insisted on the 'story-like' quality of the news agenda- where it all depends who's telling the story and why. The reason I say this is not because I think there isn't a reality to be accounted for, but because so many people in big media seem to see accounts of events simply as ways of projecting their own personal agenda. It's time to arm the public (in the UK) with a legal foundation for the scepticism they already feel- which might mean removing some of the legal foundations of the priviledges that media such as the BBC have historically enjoyed. In fact it's not just 'time', reform is way overdue.

Widening Horizons

Melanie Philips (back from a hiatus) does a great job with her appraisal of the Butler report and adds in the Senate report for good measure. She points out what I pointed out: that Butler backs the intelligence on Iraq far more than the press reported. It's the closest thing to my own analysis I've read- and with Melanie you get the reassuring feeling she's done her homework.

The New York Post covers the story of how Oil for Food money siphoned by Saddam is believed to be paying for terrorism in Iraq today. This seems to have come from newly released documents held by the Iraqi government. Jihad is an expensive business even if you have human 'bombs' to launch (via Friends of Saddam).

These two stories show I think the vital need for a broader and more interested look at the stories emerging from Iraq, and other places too.

Sanitised Politics

The complaint that people are disengaged from the political process is a common one. However, what's less commented on is the way the media tend to cleanse politics of all its abrasive qualities where it suits them. As one of the global 'mediators' of news, the BBC is one of the biggest culprits.

It's particularly suspicious in this case where Iraq is accusing Iran of misdoings. The Beeb's links with both Al Jazeera and the Foreign Office are well known. The Foreign Office's view of Iran as a potential ally is well known. So it's not surprising that the pattern of interference from Iran (as well as London-educated Assad's Syria) has been played down or ignored by the BBC.

According to Iraq's Defence Minister (reported by the Washington Times) speaking to a Saudi newspaper,

"The Iranian infiltration is wide and unprecedented since the founding of the Iraqi state"

Meanwhile, down in BBCOnline's own sleepy hollow, it is reported that 'Iraq seeks border security boost'.

Well, you could put it that way, at the danger of losing interest in Iraqi concerns altogether. The Beeb gets the story inside out and back to front when they say

'Both Iraq and the US have accused Syria and Iran of failing to prevent Islamic militants crossing into the country to stage attacks.'

In fact it's clear from the Times report and other reports that the real Iraqi concerns are about active Iranian interventions in Iraq- rather than passive lack of assistance. Active interference that the media has chosen to ignore- lke this. This means not just terrorists being let in but state agents sent. As the Defence Minister says:

"The Iranians infiltrated the various departments of the state in general and have set up intelligence and security centers in several Iraqi cities."

So, once again we discover that underinformation becomes misinformation, on this occasion strangely coincident with a British political interest in not annoying Iran.

BBC's Big Government Love-in

It's only to be expected that the BBC will suck up to the multilateralists, the transnationalists, of this world. How reassuring for a vast state-funded bureaucratic media edifice to put its trust in people committed to the kind of world which will always have a place for the BBC (they've already begun to help fund it, after all).

Today the European Parliament opened after its little (not to say puny) exercise in democracy (not that it has much power- a fact not pointed out by the Beeb). For the BBC this was 'historic', the 'big day', a day of 'joy' and 'light'. The only bad fairy to appear was a French Communist (boo, hiss) called Wurz who said that Europe had become rather grey. No mention of the eurosceptics who did so well in the election, and only the most oblique mention of the poor turnouts that reduced the elections in Eastern Europe (supposedly the reason why the day was historic) to something approaching farce. Even Wurz's note of 'realism' was found to be centred on the supposed spread of the 'liberal market' and the European fringe's support for the GWB's Gulf war.

In other words, the BBC's fantasy bubble glistened brightly in the Strasbourg sunshine. On days like this they can brush away apathy, shrug off the eurosceptics, dismiss the farce of a Parliamentary President elected by nudge-nudge, wink-wink, and bask in the sheer bigness of their transnational dreams.

Meanwhile, over the other side of the Atlantic, another transnational dream is being polished- the 'fabulous' duo of Kerry and Edwards.

It's as if the BBC writer, 'Quivering' Jill Mcgivering (yes, her voice does sound as though she's got a bit cold in the swimming pool), were determined to fill her page with as many positive adjectives as she could about Kerry-Edwards, while trying to make it look as though she was scrutinising them. Consequently, Kerry is 'more' of this or that than Edwards, and Edwards is 'more' of that or this. But it's all good: between them they're 'methodical', 'careful', 'systematic', 'ambitious', 'visionary', 'impressive', 'uncompromising' while remaining 'idealist', 'thoughful' 'cautious' and 'radical'.

Yes, all of those and many, many more are implausibly attributed to Kerry and Edwards because they are, according to Jill, opposites. Cunning old Jill.

No mention in describing Kerry's 'impressive record' of flip-flop Kerry, the antiwar Vietnam hero who's supported without supporting the Iraq war- and much else too in a similar vein. No mention of Edwards' means of making his fortune by chasing ambulances. And no, I do not want a report to be filled with detractors of the, ahem, dynamic duo. One single critical voice would have been a relief, before the Beeb plumbed the depths of their free advertising for leftist transnationalists.

One like this, for instance.

Pride of Place to Arthur Chrenkoff amongst the three latest blogs I've added to my blogroll. After at least a minute's thought I decided to put Chrenkoff under my 'News' section. Many are called, but few are chosen. Also amongst the elect are Laban Tall and the gentleman from God Save the Queen.

Actually Chrenkoff must be feeling quite good about himself- and not just because he's now linked to this blog. Maybe this would even rank a bit higher in his list of achievements.

So I goes all round the internet (well, nearly) and I finds that the bestest response to Lord Butler comes from an Iraqi.

It's heartening, in a way, that Mohammed and co. put such a lot of store by what some British toff says, and of course every story like this one makes the BBC look good since they seem to be the source of choice for most of the Middle East (there's a darker side to that, too). roger simon says 'Some day I'd like to go to Iraq and meet these guys.'- me too.

I had a thought or two about Butler as well.

You'll doubtless have noted the diminution of hysterical press coverage and infer rightly from that that the journos have begun to read Lord Butler's report. If Butler's enquiry were a game of chess it would be a winning stalemate for Blair. Why so generous? Perhaps Butler felt Blair had had the courage (and it took courage to take on the BBC et al) to confront the poor strategy of the past and didn't need reminding of the real errors therein.

The reason for the low-level intelligence Butler so mildy chastises was that we were relying until 1998 on UNscom and from 2002 on UNmovic, and by 2002 we were, predictably, panicking as a black informationless hole opened up in between those years- in a spin-controlled sort of way. We had discovered we couldn't on the one hand support an above-board inspections process and on the other try to infiltrate the Iraqi regime at high levels (The CIA tried and spectacularly failed to engineer a coup d'etat- and seemingly the Brits were more dovish and hopeful Saddam would disappear in a puff of smoke, and that nanny would kiss it better and...). This meant we were in the dark about the many levels of secrecy at which the regime operated.

This is not what Butler says- which is the element of whitewash in his report. He never examines the longer-term political strategy concerning Iraq, terrorism and WMD throughout the lazy 'Tory sleaze-things can only get better' nineties which had brought us to the point of well-founded suspicion, but next to no certainty.

Anyway, if our media team has been skittled out by Butler and the political pressure-cooker, the Weekly Standard team have been going into bat- and by my reckoning have piled up tons of runs. Not bad for a country for whom it's never been cricket.

ps. I will talk about other stuff- soon. I go wherever seems right at the time and at the moment that's just here.

Hadn't Much Time to look at the web today (and I'm having trouble with my provider too), but I found it interesting to find LGF debating the Telegraph. The Telegraph has becme fairly unpredictable and sometimes untrustworthy lately.

The subject highlighted was Iranian links to Al Qaeda; the report was that Iran let most of the 9/11 terrorists pass through their country unchallenged from Afghanistan. That scenario doesn't sound much of a revelation to me- in fact it seems fairly predictable. It doesn't seem a big deal for a radical Islamic state to let Islamic terrorists go on their way to do their worst in the West. Even though Shias and Sunnis frequently blame each other for the low state of Islamic culture they can hold their noses well enough when it suits them.

I Love the Internet

To be specific, one of the things I love is the way bloggers hover like vultures around a story, often pecking with far more vigour than the big media offers, and then suddenly there's a breakthrough and a spectacular finale (you might say, 'the kill'). That seems to have happened with the Joe Wilson affair- and I think Mark Steyn is rapidly acquiring honorary blogger status. There's something of the spirit of blog about him- and this time it's really moving (via Glenn):

'Saddam wanted yellowcake for one reason: to strike at his neighbors in the region, and beyond that at Britain, America and his other enemies. In other words, he wanted the uranium in order to kill you.'

He's never been more tabloid; but I like it.

*

Just to make my position on the Butler report clear (and I'm referring, as before, to the Iraq section)- I don't believe what I'm hearing from the vast majority of journalists: Butler did find a great deal he was satisfied with in terms of analysis of intelligence and judgements arising from it. The number of approving remarks Butler makes about key assessments and judgements concerning Saddam, his intentions, threat and capability, suggests strongly he is satisfied with the overall approach. I don't buy the 'devil in the detail' view point, because the details Butler takes issue with are no more significant than the details (the overwhelming number) where he agrees with what was done.

The problem seems to have been that to know exactly what was there and where required the kind of infiltration at high levels that we'd given up hope of when relying on UNscom. After that, without hope of in depth revelations we were dependent on a handful of mid-level contacts, overhead photos, and the rest was guesstimation. The problem was not dodgy contacts, bad analysis, or false conclusions- the problem was our reliance on Unscom and the blindness that resulted when UNscom left in '98 (which is not to say that Butler disapproves of Unscom- he said it had been largely effective in restraining Saddam. As a strategy for dealing with a murderous dictator's WMD ambitions though, 'largely effective' would have been a very worrisome situation- and I think Butler recognises that.)

*

Another reason to question our late '90s strategy is outlined in this World Magazine article about Unscam. It's a good summary of where we have got to in the saga- and I think that fears about Saddam's resurgence in the '90s were fuelled by the success he made out of Oil-for-Food - success for himself that is, not the Iraqi people (via Friends of Saddam).

Paul Reynolds has been, as they say, 'all over' the Butler report. His several analyses have, however, in my view been selective and used to enforce a simple thesis: that Butler in his unaccusatory judgements just wished to soften the blow on British Intelligence which fell so heavily on the CIA from the Senate report.

Although Reynolds suggests that the Senate 'loves criticising agencies of the government', he does not mean that the Senate's criticism may have been exaggerated (a product of the hothouse perhaps). Quite the opposite- for Reynolds it is the Butler report that has been too weak in its criticisms.

According to Reynolds, the British report was 'loathe to criticise' and 'cautious', whereas the US report was 'decisive'. For him, the task is to 'decode' the Butler report.

On this occasion, weirdly, American values appear to have won the BBC's heart!

As a sidelight to this, guess who was popping up on BBConline with his response to Butler? None other than Gregory Dyke, no doubt as bitter as Ray Parlour's (ex-)wife to have walked away with only approaching half a million pounds. And, needless to say, the Beeb's latest enthusiasm (in both NewsNight and BBC News contexts) has been the supposed 'underpinning' piece of intelligence, which was withdrawn- guess when- in July 03, just as Hutton was conducting his investigation into Gilligan's claims about the 'dodgy' dossier (and Dr Kelly's death, too).

As an indication of Reynolds' analysis, compare Reynolds' and Butler's view of intelligence sources in Iraq:

Reynolds: 'It turns out that human sources used by the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) were unreliable'

Butler: 'Of the two dominant sources, the first reported accurately and authoritatively on some key issues... the second dominant source remains the subject of continuing SIS validation.'

(Reynolds' quote taken from his article 'The Devil Is In The Detail')

Not jumping to any conclusions then, are we Paul?

Actually, contrary to Reynolds' assessment, the report is full of affirmations that the assessments of the intelligence services were professional and circumspect, with only occasional exceptions.

From my reading of the report, I would offer an alternative thesis: that Butler's criticisms are mild because it was never intended that he should critique the real problem- the lack of an aggressive and detailed strategy to effectively infiltrate Saddam's regime prior to 9/11 and in the months afterwards (which is no longer relevant now that we have taken the ultimate necessary action).[Update: I should stop tinkering with what I've said here! Obviously after 9/11 infiltrating Saddam's regime would have been much harder. However, between 1998- when UNscom left- and 2001 we had little inside information. This leaves the previous wholehearted UNscom strategy open to question, as well as the period '98- 01.]

The purpose of Butler was to offer something to the Paul Reynolds's of this world as a way of saying 'look, we've had an enquiry and... etc... yawn- let's go and beat the Tories.'

Standing Up; Being Counted.

Claudia Rosett's recent testimony to Congress on Unscam was excellent, and just a bit moving- judging from the text ( via Friends of Saddam).

Should've said yesterday: Mark Steyn had a great way to celebrate Bastille day. Truly, a man after my own heart who would like to rain on their parade (sadly, it was sunny).

Well, Butler didn't really say very much, did he? (I've only scanned the report, but I've seen the man's public pronouncements and heard a bit more since.) Whatever he said that seemed to trap Tony Blair or his Government (no real sharp intakes of breath- so different to Hutton) was followed with a wry smile by some kind of escape route for those concerned- and no-one was to blame.

I think Tony Blair chose his men deliberately (but fairly) when he selected Hutton and Butler.

The BBC's favoured approach in reporting Butler's view of the intelligence has been been to emphasize its 'serious flaws' and that it was 'unreliable'- yet the fact that Butler denied any individual responsibility indicates that no-one either fabricated or was notoriously incompetent. This has to mean that the intelligence was not so flawed as all that, otherwise how bad does it have to be before someone is to blame?

One of the important things Butler said was that the claim that Saddam sought uranium from Niger was based on good intelligence ie. he believes it happened. I am sure that one fact- that our expert opinion believes that Saddam was clandestinely seeking materials for nuclear purposes under the nose of the IAEA- would be a clincher for many people if it were put to them directly (Belgravia Despatch has more- and cites Butler specifically- via Glenn).

Contrasting Butler's findings with those of the Hutton enquiry I'd say that in the case of Gilligan we have someone claiming a fabrication of evidence- which was found to be categorically untrue. In the Butler report we find a number of assertions that were not fabricated but were inadequately contextualised- but they were consistent with the thesis that Saddam was seeking offensive weaponry and capabilities. The intelligence, and the politician's expression of it, doesn't match the reality we know at present, but it isn't inconsistent with a general thesis we know to have been true and which justified strong action against Iraq. So, Gilligan lied (and so have the 'stoppers') and our politicians aren't as competent as we would like, but we live in a democracy- Hutton and Butler in a nutshell.

And that's ok- but I wouldn't want to leave it there. It will take more than generally about roughly right to win a war on terror- and I think the establishment hasn't woken up to that yet. On the other hand, how much more sleepy would they have had to have been if they hadn't followed up their threats against Saddam's regime? Frighteningly so it seems to me.

Elsewhere...

Brownie at Harry's Place has a simple conclusion to make (but others dissent). Norm likes what he hears from Tony Blair- and so, in fact, do I.

Butler Today.

This discussion of his dilemmas gave me a good head start (via Samizdata)

British Empire Day Today.

Well, no it isn't, and that we abandoned what was 'Empire Day' and changed its date from Queen Vic's birthday (24th May) to Queen Liz's (June 11th) and its title to 'Commonwealth Day', and don't celebrate it either, tells its own story about head-in-the-sand British denial and self-flagellation (in this sense I'd be all for that ban on smacking ;-) ); there just seems to be a bit of reflection on the topic of Empire at the moment.

I think for a fair number of the British public the war in Iraq conjured up an image of the past; a feeling of colonial meddling that fuelled the absolutism of the marchers. If you didn't feel that way, either because you aren't British (the surest way!) or because you prefer to avoid such stereotypes as British Empire = Evil, that's perhaps why you were open to other arguments including the one that said that getting rid of Saddam was both a pre-emptive move and a progressive one, and that it was not all about oil.

I've always felt that we must resist the desire to characterise the Britsh Empire as evil. There are undoubtedly power relations that are unjust and the British Empire threw up quite a few of them, and if you want an example of overreach it would be a good one, but it's precisely in learning such faults that you see each situation as different and don't equate Rumsfeld with Palmerston or whatever comparisons the modern British mind is inclined to make. That way lunacy lies and they aren't called moonbats for nothing.

*

The Beeb has an article today about a minor renaissance in the teaching of the British Empire in schools. They call the British Empire a 'thorny' issue; I don't think they mean 'as a rose has thorns', I think they just mean thorny. Of course one issue clouding our history has been that our cousins in the US tended to look down on the Empire (yes, there was some history behind that!), and they certainly backed its dismantlement throughout the 20th C.. This is one reason why 'high' Tories don't back the US more wholeheartedly over Iraq.

Anyway, the Beeb article has come about because there is a new museum, The British Empire and Commonwealth Museum, which has opened in Bristol. Actually it opened in 2002, so I guess the Beeb's spiel about it being acceptable to talk about Empire again is partly to deflect attention away from the fact that it's taken them so long to feature it (there are no other hits from a search of the BBC website). I stayed in Bristol last year and if I'd known about it I might have visited.

*

Natalie Solent has an interesting post at Samizdata. I don't know whether I'd call it an investigation of the intervention of the state into the lifestyles of traditional peoples- the story concerns the Bushmen of the Khalahari desert in Botswana- or an attempt to make sense of BBC reporting. I can definitely relate to her experience trying to piece together the implications of various BBC reports.

It also reminded me about an old book I've got called 'Our Empire Story' which I read as a child towrds the end of the 80's (very much out of line with my contemporaries). According to this book which was given to my father to mark the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953,

'The Bushmen were the most ignorant [of three indigenous S.A. races], although it is thought they were the oldest of the three races. They were of a yellowish-brown colour, and very small. But although they were small, they were very wiry and could run with wonderful speed. They lived in caves and holes in the ground, wore no clothes, and had no possessions at all. They roamed about hunting the wild animals with which Africa swarmed, living on them and on wild plants'

I'm sure the Empire Museum won't put it quite that way- but maybe it won't call them 'wonderful' either.

*

Via Natalie's own blog I found a blog that seems very cutting edge in the light of the new trend in reexamining the British Empire (I'm sure the Beeb knows what it thinks about it the Empire though.). It's called 'God Save The Queen' so it should get some hits from an odd mix of British patriots and Sex Pistols devotees.

*

But I think I should end this evening's little disquisition (I just started so I'll finish) by saying whether I think the British Empire was 'bad'. What is my answer to this 'thorny' question? My answer is that I don't think there is such a thing as a 'bad' political entity, although many are if not most are 'bad' in practice. There are 'bad' situations, and the British Empire had many; but doubtless those situations were composed of many incidents, some of which were bad. If these situations were not solved or healed by the people who initiated them then that is 'bad'- and there's no doubt we did start things we haven't solved subsequently. Often though what is bad is the walking away. Like the blogger at God Save The Queen, I'm a fan of Philip Larkin, and he knew that fact well:

Homage To A Government

Next year we are to bring all the soldiers home
For lack of money, and it is all right.
Places they guarded, or kept orderly,
Must guard themselves, and keep themselves orderly.
We want the money for ourselves at home
Instead of working. And this is all right.

It's hard to say who wanted it to happen,
But now it's been decided nobody minds.
The places are a long way off, not here,
Which is all right, and from what we hear
The soldiers there only made trouble happen.
Next year we shall be easier in our minds.

Next year we shall be living in a country
That brought its soldiers home for lack of money.
The statues will be standing in the same
Tree-muffled squares, and look nearly the same.
Our children will not know it's a different country.
All we can hope to leave them now is money.

Philip Larkin- From 'High Windows' F&F 1974

Irony Of The Day: Iraq and France To Restore Relations

Notice how it was Iraq that severed relations with the French in 1991, and no mention is made of relations since, but, amusingly, the French say they wish 'to promote and to reinforce the ties of friendship and co-operation existing between their two countries and two peoples, on the basis of mutual respect for their sovereignty.'

'Co-operation existing', eh? 'Respect for their sovereignty', huh? Every syllable positively dripping with it- and none of it picked up by the Beeb (and neither is any of the 1991-2003 realpolitik that took place reported). By way of a retrospective, this article from March '03 is of interest. But, in the spirit of fraternity and equality, I give the French ambassador (writing April '04) the freedom to defend his country's record.

I join the email-the-biased-Beeb club.

Yup, I did it. I wrote a response in one of their feedback sections (not 'Have Your Say'- this was something I wanted to be read). Ok, it may be a bit over-written, but I needed to say something about the Beeb's behaviour towards this Al-Qaradhawi bloke, who was banned from America with good reason way back in 1999. I think I could have done it better but it's difficult writing coherently in those cramped boxes and without preview (or did I miss something?). Anyway here it is as it was wrote:

Dear Beeb, [I've tacked this on- needed an intro I think]

I am writing to complain about persistently misleading BBC reporting concerning Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi.

Consider these words of Al-Qaradhawi, reported in Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, a London based paper (obtained from Memri):

'" First of all, due to the colonialist, occupying, racist, and [plundering] nature of Israeli society, it is, in fact, a military society. Anyone past childhood, man or woman, is drafted into the Israeli army. Every Israeli is a soldier in the army, either in practical terms or because he is a reservist soldier who can be summoned at any time for war. This fact needs no proof. Those they call 'civilians' are in effect 'soldiers' in the army of the sons of Zion.

" Second , Israeli society has a unique trait that makes it different from the other human societies, and that is that as far as the people of Palestine are concerned, it is a 'society of invaders' who came from outside the region – from Russia or America, from Europe or from the lands of the Orient – to occupy Palestine and settle in it…

"Those who are invaded have the right to fight the invaders with all means at their disposal in order to remove [the invaders] from their homes and send them back to the homes from whence they came… This is a Jihad of necessity, as the clerics call it, and not Jihad of choice… Even if an innocent child is killed as a result of this Jihad – it was not intended, but rather due to the necessities of the war… Even with the passage of time, these [Israeli] so-called 'civilians' do not stop being invaders, evil, tyrants, and oppressors…"

In the BBC2 NewsNight interview with Al-Qaradhawi the translator said that suicide bombings were legitimated because Israeli women were 'militarised'. This reflects Al-Qaradhawi's views fairly, although it ought to be explained that he means that the Israelis en masse are invaders- a fact he considers obvious when the nature of the IDF is considered- and therefore collectively fair targets. You, however, in the Online report, quoted him from the same interview saying '"an Israeli woman is not like women in our societies, because she is a soldier."' This much narrower definition- which sounds superficially less rational that his actual opinion- does not account for suicide bombings by our normal definitions, since many Israeli women in fact do not serve, and we would not consider children, old men or old women (and that you could argue meant 45+) to be in any sense 'combatants'- yet Qaradhawi would consider these targets legitimate.

The fact that Israeli women are conscripted (though many are exempted) is only a fraction of the story. The term 'militarised' much more fully reflects his views. I feel your organisation has changed his words from a natural and valid translation to make them less incendiary- moreover, diminishing them by comparison with other on-the-record statements. Since this man was supposed to be under 'close surveillance' during his stay in Britain, and since for many British people this interview and reports based on it were their 'introduction' to a man revered by groups that support Al Qaeda I regard this a matter of some gravity.

Furthermore, in your article Analysis: Interpreting Islam , you compound your misinformation by saying 'Sheikh Al-Qaradawi believes, for example, that it is right to target Israeli women, because they are army reservists who can be summoned to active duty at any time - an argument that is also used by Palestinian militant groups such as Hamas to justify suicide attacks.'

In fact Al-Qaradhawi's remarks relate to justifying suicide bombings against Israelis period. How does the fact that women can technically be called into the Israeli army justify killing children?
The point is that he has a wider justification for all of this, which you ignore: Al-Qaradhawi advocates (quite clearly) the expulsion of the Jews from the Middle East. He wants to send them back to the countries they came from, and will regard them as aggressors until they have gone.

You simply don't do Al-Qaradhawi's views justice. He's a clever and very influential man with some views that many 'culturally unaware' people would object to. You'd prefer to shield them from that reality: please desist from dissembling and tell it like it is.

Have you ever come across men or women in uniforms selling The WarCry magazine in the street? Well here's the Beeb's 'Anti-WarCry' edition for Sunday 11th July 04 (can't imagine it'll be stealth edited much)- I'll let you decide which one is more evangelical.

By the by- a startlingly interesting article on BBConline from Justin Webb that doesn't make Mark Steyn look like a genius by comparison. Steyn writes about Edwards in the Telegraph today- where there are a number of really hard-hitting and interesting articles (Cummins and Myers that I've read) of which Steyn's (for once) is not the strongest! Steyn's best can be found in the Sun-Times- and this one does make Kerry's recent attack on Bush (the focus of the BBC's Anti-WarCry) look absurd.

Israel's Victory.

Charles Krauthammer tells it like it is:

'Once Israel has withdrawn from Gaza and has completed the fence, terrorism as a strategic option will be effectively dead.'

EU Constitution: An Observation.

I've mentioned before in this blog that I wanted to cover the EU constitution to some degree (though I can never come near this blog for depth and detail). It's difficult to know how to do that (I'm just getting my head wrapped around it- or is it the other way round?), but I think where an item comes up in the news sometimes you can assess how things would change once the Constitution comes into force.

This passage (From Jens-Peter Bonde's Reader Friendly Constitution) interested me in the light of the current International Court furore about Israel's barrier:

'Member States shall actively and unreservedly support the Union's common foreign and security policy in a spirit of loyalty and mutual solidarity and shall comply with the Union's actions in this area'. (Article I-15.2)

From the BBC I learn that 'The US, along with several other countries including the UK, had argued the court should stay out of the issue.'

whereas according to the Washington Times:

'The EU has thrown its weight behind Friday's International Court of Justice ruling judging Israel's West Bank barrier to be illegal.'

So, that policy at least will have to change if the British accept the Constitution, and Israel will lose one more lukewarm supporter to the international Islamic front.

Update: This Belmont Club reference to the 'European national interest' is very interesting in the context of a common foreign policy. So is this post from the EURef blog about a BBC assisted 'plea' for British backing for the Euro space programme.

Several annoyances.

It wasn't the damnation of the CIA that annoyed me today, it was the way the BBC gave centre stage to the International Court's verdict on the barrier. [Update: actually the treatment the BBC gave of the report on the CIA did annoy me, after I'd watched a combination of the 10pm News and NewsNight- quite appalling wall-to-wall carpeted I-told-you-so triumphalism, without the tiniest bit of qualification, except to express obvious regret that the Bush administration hadn't been accused of lying- yet.] I couldn't tell from the BBC report whether the I.C. were ruling it illegal in principle, or just clumsily routed, as Israel's own courts ruled. If the former then I think they're doing their best to undermine their own foundation in the 'development of methods for the pacific settlement of international disputes' (I.C. history) by undermining the only 'regional arrangement' that has a proven record of stopping suicidal maniacs.

Anyway, I prefer LGF's take on this. It sums up my view of what the BBC calls the Palestinians' 'moral victory'. I truly hope they carry on building the barrier until anyone can demonstrate (and the proof better be good) that there's a better way to stop suicide bombers that doesn't imperil Israel's existence.

If anything, the Sudanese (supported by 'guess who?') had me even more annoyed; more or less saying keep your nose out of our genocide thank you very much. Again the Beeb obliged by leading with the spiel that 'Sudan has warned the United States against creating another Iraq-style situation by getting too involved in the Darfur conflict.' The implication entertained by the Beeb is that there is something leprous-like about Iraq which should be warning the US against further 'adventures' (as Jon Snow would put it).

Finally, this is no surprise: and a success for the impartial BBC who have managed to manage the news sufficiently to allow Al-Qaradawi to rally the Jihadis and go whistling on his way.

The always good value Tim Blair has an observation about scandals and media attention: comparing the public recogniton rate for the Oil-for-Food scam with that for Enron.

I've thought the same for a long time regarding the BBC's coverage. Last night I was treated to Matt Frei and co. at 10pm talking of how a 'wave of corruption' had spread across the States as they held a hack mini-fest on BBC news to commemorate the indictment of Ken Lay.

I've also been bemused (well, nominally so) by the lack of coverage of Parmalat. What's Parmalat? Only the EU's largest financial scandal ever (that we know of, apart perhaps from the EU itself). This would sit neatly on the crest of any notional wave of corruption alongside the UN's largest financial scandal ever- where the most culpable parties at the UN and corporate level are thought to have been the Russians and French.

Just for kicks I'll quote two comparable BBC nuggets about the Parmalat and Enron affairs from the two articles I've highlighted (there's a choice of over 400 for Enron; only 61 for Parmalat):

Enron: 'Enron left behind $15bn of debts, its shares become worthless, and 20,000 workers around the world lost their jobs. '

Parmalat: 'Industry minister Antonio Marzano said the proposals included plans to return the insolvent group to profit in 2005 and 2006.

But he would not give details on how the dairy multinational planned to tackle its 14bn euro ($17m) debt.'

Yes, it would be easy to pontificate that they are not similar businesses etc etc, but the sums of debt involved are startlingly comparable (you can see who's in the lead!), and it therefore seems we are being kidded if we receive the message that corporate malfeasance is any greater in capitalist America than in social market Europe. I would say that's the line the BBC consistently 'sell', but then that fits my general theory that if you work out what the BBC are saying and come to roughly an opposite viewpoint you'll have it about spot-on. Here's how far I had to go to find my views echoed in the English language (maybe there's a French version languishing somewhere).

Oh, and on the subject of scandals, I think this is a scandal too: seems the French have been telling porky pies (again) about the presence of BSE (Mad Cow disease) in their herds. It must be all that cooperation inside the EU that makes them so helpful.

Now, where was that wave of corruption sweeping across, again?

Understanding Al-Qaradawi

Yesterday evening I happened to sit down and watch BBC's Newsnight- and the subject was the visit of a controversial Islamic preacher, Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, to the UK. Today there was an accompanying BBConline article- and listening to the NewsNight item alongside the article you notice a change has taken place between what the translator reports of him in the NewsNight version and the quotes ascribed to Al-Qaradawi in the written version. It's basically only one word and an alteration from the plural to the singular, but it happens to be at the crux of the controversy surrounding his visit- his support for suicide bombing in Israel.

In the written account Al-Qaradawi is quoted defending his views by saying:

'"an Israeli woman is not like women in our societies, because she is a soldier." '

Whereas, in the recorded interview the translator says

'Israeli women are not like women in our society, because Israeli women are militarised'

I notice that the BBConline writer is an Arab affairs analyst, so, to be charitable, perhaps the alteration is to get a more perfect translation of what the preacher said, but certainly the original translator's version is much more comprehensible. In the BBConline version it comes across as a clumsy way of saying that Israeli women take part in the IDF- it's a fact that conscription applies to both men and women in Israel, although many women gain exemptions- and so the point is about Israel's militarism. This is the standard western defence of suicide bombers: what else can they do when Israel is so militarily domineering?

In the translator's version, by contrast, it could, and probably should, be understood following from the notion that Israeli women are part of a military 'occupation', and therefore the women are 'militarised' in the way that occupiers-by-force are militarised- that is if it's in order to justify the killing of what we would call civilians in suicide bombings, which Al-Qaradawi was certainly trying to do, rather than members of the IDF.

The question that springs from that is whether Al-Qaradawi sees suicide bombings as a response for the occupation of the Gaza Strip or the West Bank, or whether he views them a response to a Jewish state occupying a place in the Middle East.

Here you would need to bring in another of Al-Qaradawi's points from the interview with BBC's NewsNight- that he did not support the suicide bombers in Iraq. The reason he gave for that was that he supported Islamic suicide bombers (he called them martyrs) where there was no other way to confront their enemies (presumably the enemies of Islam)- the implication being that Iraqis had a way to confront their 'enemies' in Iraq without the need for suicide bombings; presumably through the Iraqi government.

Ok; but what about the openended offer of negotiations following an end to violence that has been the Israeli stance in perpetuity- where is this different from the coalition's willingness to concede to democratic demands from Iraqis?

The answer is surely simple and demonstrates Al-Qaradawi's beliefs: the coalition are temporary guests in Iraq; the Israelis (in their own view) are in Israel forever. Hence there is a non-negotiable issue over which muslims in that region cannot confront the Israelis apart from terrorist acts: the existence of Israel itself.

That is surely the viewpoint of the man that Ken Livingstone has welcomed to London, and it is surely true that the BBC are doing their best to protect our government (for their own good, you understand) from having to bar him or expel him- as other countries have done- by muddying the implications of his statements.

To support my view: some statements of Al-Qaradawi- one of which tells you what he thinks of Palestinian negotiations with Israel. Also, here's the Herald quoting him using the form of words from the BBCNewsnight interview rather than the BBConline version. Finally, here's the BBC covering the controversy they've preferred to soften.

Couple of commentaries I think are essentials: First, David Kopel's list of Moore's deceits (he doesn't call them lies but some clearly seem to be ;-)) (via Melanie). It's quite scholarly and moderate, and I'll bet there are much grander ways of ripping the Moore facade into shreds, but he goes at F. 9/11 like a woodpecker to a tree and does a very fine job of exposing its hollowness.

And then there's Steyn. I think he's at his best in this 'Happy Warrior' column, combining his feel for personality with his expertise in celebrity and his historical sense to analyse reactions to the death of Reagan. This part reminded me of a BBC report which, uh, 'inspired' this post at B-BBC:

'In the hours after Reagan’s death, CNN was wall-to-wall with media bigfeet, none of whom voted for him and all of whom spoke of his smile and his twinkle and his “wonderful sense of humor” as if these were things apart from his political philosophy, rather than the external evidence of it'

If I quote from the Tom Carver report for the Beeb I think you'll see what I mean:

'However illusory or insubstantial it may have been, Reagan's folksy cheerfulness did help to restore Americans' sense of self-confidence.'

Developments


The BBC is re-starting an Arabic news service, years after its original venture collapsed and turned into Al Jazeera. Now, according to Reason, many Al Jaz. journalists are keen to join up with the Beeb again after experiencing the gentle editorial touch of the Qatari royal family. To this observer it seems just another twist in the incestuous saga of the BBC and Arab journalists- and of course, the Foreign Office, who are going to fund it.

Also, why did the BBC report Iranian guards expelled from the US, but not report Iranian agents making bombs in Baghdad? Why aren't they reporting the views of the Iraqi government (supported by this incident) that 'surrounding nations' have sponsored violence in Iraq? Normally they like to report the views of governments around the world that we'd often view as substandard- they've often reported crackpot Mugabe aphorisms and conspiracy theories-, whereas Iraq has the most legitimate government conceivable outside of having a fair democratic process (which will have to wait till next year).

Captain Ed asks similar questions of other media- but in my view the BBC is the best informed of any media going; time and again I've noticed the BBC getting a story quicker than CNN (which is about the only comparable network), such that sometimes it seems like CNN are just cribbing. I am left with the opinion that the BBC sits on more stories than other networks publish, as well as publishing more than any other (that's a guess, but I'd imagine an accurate one).

Just A Sampling of the BBC's focus at the moment.

I'm going to mention three reports, and see where they lead me.

The one that stood out for me was the US army deserter story which was given the lede 'Canadian dreams:
US soldiers deserting from Iraq seek refuge in the north'. This seemed to me to be continuing the Michael Moore-inspired popular peacenik uprising theme.

I suppose it is stating the obvious to say that the lede creates an expectation the story can't fulfil. Neither of the two deserters (yes, they can justify pluralising their headline- just) actually came from Iraq.

I suspect though that the story has other nerves to touch. For example (although it is not mentioned), the strange affair of the Lebanese-American who was not beheaded in Iraq (who just could be an actual deserter from the US Iraq mission); or as the report hints at the end, the flotation of the idea of reviving the draft. In any case it seems indefensible as a feature-length story; basically old and unsurprising stuff with a tiny number of soldiers involved (three even if you count the one who didn't go to Canada), which merely gives a chance for the Beeb to recite the kind of historical associations which appeal to them, such as the Vietnam draft dodgers and -one for the 'home' side- the colonists 'loyal to the crown' who headed north to Canada after the war of independence. Perhaps this seemed a good way to dampen the afterglow of the 4th of July for any overeager bumpkins out there (I speak as an experienced overeager bumpkin of the rarer european variety).

Ok, enough Canadian dreams; let's get down to earth with some real negativity about Iraq.

It's fair to say that when any pro-war person has been scratching around for good things to say about postwar Iraq, they have turned to the Kurds; it's also fair to say that the BBC have been less interested in the Kurds than in, say, the Sunni triangle. Given that the Beeb have been like an echo chamber for those calling for handover to Iraqis, and channeling doubt about the US' commitment to doing that (especially with regard to oil), it's more than mildly exasperating to find Jim Muir reporting 'There was no sense of celebration in Iraqi Kurdistan as Paul Bremer flew out of Baghdad after handing over sovereignty to the new Iraqi government.' Muir's mood music is utterly empty, since as he himself reports, 'In immediate practical terms, it will make no difference to the Iraqi Kurds.' He could also have pointed out that Bremer had little involvement with the Kurds because of the relative stability and autonomy of that region and his preoccupation with matters further south- so Bremer's departure could not possibly have evoked much emotion from the Kurds.

What's interesting is the way that when teeing up a problem for the coalition, the BBC can talk about all sorts of things they've previously ignored. For instance:

'Since the overthrow of the Baathist regime last year, there is practically full employment and a building boom in Iraqi Kurdistan.'

This is the kind of clarity we have only heard from bloggers like IraqtheModel and Arthur Chrenkoff, but it seems the BBC is aware of good news when it actually spells bad news. The BBC coverage produces riddles like 'when is bad news not bad news? When it spells bad news!'. In this case the 'bad news' that the liberation of Iraq was hugely successful in Iraqi Kurdistan is ok because it spells the bad news (or is it 'good' news?) that the Kurds are inclined to agitate for independence. It's this topsy-turvey reasoning that makes reading a BBC report the exasperating business it is.

Finally, another instance of how the Beeb think in this report from Iraq. It goes under the simplistic headline 'Mistrust breeds resentment in Iraq', one of those little trains of thought you can continue for yourself: mistrust breeds resentment, leads to violence, provokes response, breeds resentment, leads to mistrust etc. etc- hey, it's almost a 'cycle of violence'!

Once again I am taken aback by BBC journalists describing the good old days after the toppling of Saddam (when in fact they spent their time screaming about museums being looted and hospitals raided etc etc) only to find it helps build up a vision of opportunities wasted:

'Looking through my photographs from Iraq last year, there are so many happy faces, so many smiles... Many Iraqis I met also said: "Thank you Bush, thank you Blair, we love freedom." '

Was it really that good for BBC journalists just over a year ago? Wow- and to think I never knew.

Much like the report on the anxious Kurds, part of this analysis from Hugh Sykes I can appreciate. It's the casual line of US behaviour as 'haughty' and 'insulting' that I can't buy. In this article we find complaints that there is a (very sketchily defined) re-Baathification of local politics. Yet the Beeb's primary beef all along has been the hasty disbandment the Baathist armed forces and command structures. Does this 'haughty' and 'insulting' coalition sound like the one led by Paul Bremer whose parting words to the Iraqi people were so warm in quoting an Iraqi poem:

'I’ve left my heart in the hands of God in Baghdad
I said good bye to him when I wished instead..
That I would say good bye to the days of my life.'

If the Beeb could, with all their advantages, work out what it is they object to in US handling of Iraq (other than the invasion itself), and then take the risk of having to admit they were mistaken, it would be so much easier to respect their editorial stance- or does being impartial really mean being all at sea within their chosen and ever broadening lines of prejudice?

Memo to Beeb: your reports are Googlable.

Here is an example of how to make a decent source with a decent story into a deceptive hook on which to hang a report.

Former Marine Ivan Medina lost his twin brother in Iraq, and his story provides Beeb New York correspondent Damian Fowler with his dramatic introduction to a report about reaction to Fahrenheit 9/11.

Fowler describes how 'the documentary... has fired up Mr Medina's anger towards the Bush administration.'

Continuing, he says 'Mr Medina was joined by other military family members who shared his outrage. Until recently, voices such as these - not typical die-hard liberals - have been less than conspicuous in challenging the government. '

The truth is somewhat different. Mr Medina lost his brother in November '03. By March 04 Mr Medina was reported by the Daily News saying 'President Bush chose to, what he has done is just taken a bad situation and made it worse. He has lied about the weapons of mass destruction...'.

Later, in April 04, Ivan Medina appeared on Larry King's show on CNN and said 'this was another plan from the president to win reelection and show and try to get his popularity back up when the truth is, we were not needed in Iraq... My brother and I never supported the war.' Notice here the long-term nature of his anti-Iraq war convictions.

So here we are in July 04, and the BBC journalist is trying to say, what? That Michael Moore inspired Ivan Medina to go gunning for Bush? That Ivan Medina has only now recognised the truth about Bush's war? All of this insinuation hiding behind the figleaf of 'until recently', a phrase almost hidden behind the emotionalised drama. The reality is that long before Fahrenheit 9/11 was on pre-released showings and lauded at Cannes the Medina family (because Ivan's father and sister were interviewed too) were on the publicity trail, for whatever personal reasons.

I have to admit this story is an improvement on others the BBC have published. The use of the term 'agitprop' by the correspondent to describe Fahrenheit 9/11 would be a major advance if it were contexualised for the reader. I do not think though that Fowler's comparison of Fahrenheit 9/11 with a party political broadcast is quite right: (in democracies) they have greater obligations to reality than Moore has demonstrated.

Also, I do not think describing MoveOn.org as a 'liberal political action committee' conveys very well the extremism of a group whose idea of supporting the troops extends as far as donating airmiles and which seems to think that The Day After Tomorrow was a serious stab at what might happen to the climate. 'Far Left Activists' would be more like it- after all these people were the Deaniacs of Howard fame.

The biggest problem in BBC coverage of Moore's film has been their insistence that opponents of the film have been conservatives, something reiterated in this report. Their failure to tap the rich vein of liberal critique of Moore's fallacious film shows a deliberate suppression of the 9/11 Democrat phenomenon and their desire to present Bush as supported by a narrow cabal of conservatives. The Medina family are willing tools in the BBC's own agitpropaganda.

Want to know where we're up to in the oil-for-food scandal investigations? Here's an effective summary from the Heritage Foundation. Considering it's a long and comprehensive article there are some very powerful statements; for example:

'The full disclosure of the Russian and French roles in trying to prevent Saddam Hussein's removal from power will have major implications for the future of U.S.-Russian and U.S.-French relations and should result in a more informed assessment of the long-term viability of political, intelligence, and military cooperation with the two countries.'

(via Friends of Saddam)

Guns to the right, guns to the left.

With satire like this, and blogs like this, against their cause, I'd say the euromaniacs might be approaching not just their Crimea, but their Waterloo.

I think Brian Micklethwaite's satire is so good because it catches the spirit of the euromaniac's position. The way he lashes the BBC for 'letting the side down with its relentlessly relentless diet of anti-EEUUGGHH! propaganda' is a cartoon-style expression of the psy-ops tactics used by all the people the BBC are generally very friendly towards. If there's one way for them to help the BBC stay friendly towards their causes it's by neutralising the criticism of the Beeb that comes from their opponents. Thus the left criticise the BBC for being pro-Israel, and the euromaniacs criticise the Beeb for being eurosceptic- giving journalists who are always looking for chances to contribute to leftist/euromaniac causes the perfect alibi when caught out.

Meanwhile, Richard North of the urbane EU referendum blog has been in the limelight this weekend, featured by the Telegraph (amongst others) for the appalling treatment he suffered at the hands of his local Council and Police Force. Read the story here.
Alternatively, read Richard's own account here. Life in Britain, eh?

Also meanwhile, another contribution to the long running Knaves vs Fools debate about BBC journalism (see below post for an example of the genre- and which way I tend!): An article based on leaked internal emails describes how as a result of unvetted reports (often sourced from non-internet BBC journalists) a senior Beebonline manager has said that 'the level of complaints is such that our credibility is on the line'. Wow, they've noticed! You can tell from the dates of the emails concerned though (Oct. '03 and Feb. '04), and my below post, that this controversy is not going away.
Also notable: check out the number of hits: 1.9 billion a month!

More Evidence (circumstantial) that the Beeb don't want to cast a light on the oil-for-food scandal.

Earlier today I found out from this report that a 'senior financial official' in the Iraqi Government had been killed by a terrorist bomb (word 'terrorist' supplied by me). I thought that was sad, but nothing more.

Later, via LGF, I come across this Reuters report which says quite simply that 'The Iraqi official heading the investigation into alleged corruption in the United Nations oil-for-food program was killed in a bomb attack earlier this week'.

Now why didn't the BBC tell me that, when they mention his seniority and details similar to those Reuters reported?

Update: I wish I'd quoted more extensively. The BBC stealth-edited the piece to include the full information- something I only discovered thanks to Susan's remark in the comments section at Biased BBC. What's the significance of this and is my original point refuted? Not really- fewer people will have read the full story; and with no acknowledgement from the Beeb that they boobed in missing essential news that situation won't be rectified by extra publicity.

Plett's Pet Topic.

Barbara Plett is on the way to being well known as a Beeb Jihadophile, and she's in good form (by that standard) in her latest offering about the Palestinians and that wall.

She manages to cover most of the bases; you know, impoverished Palestinians, an eight metre high concrete wall 'in places' through 'occupied East Jerusalem' (the joke in this one is to look at the accompanying photo where children are shown playing alongside a section of concrete wall that is being assembled- the children are almost as tall as the wall!).

After dramatising and misrepresenting that case (most of the 'wall' is actually chain-link fencing, as the BBC know well) she goes on to 'explain' the cause and effect thing that the Glasgow Media group are so keen on. Dwelling on the economic crisis amongst Palestinians, she says 'The main reason is Israel's closure policy.'

This is interesting. I was hearing about Palestinian economic woes well before the construction of the wall began- and we can't forget the basic reality that no intifada = no wall. Also, it cannot be denied that a country subject to frequent explosions is less attractive to investment and visitors, so an unwalled region with frequent suicide bombings and military responses is unlikely to be a honeypot.

But for Plett it's all wall, wall, wall, and she drags in an Israeli economist to confirm that this is merely wicked Zionism at work. He dutifully confirms that the idea behind the wall is to put pressure on the Palestinians by impoverishing them.

Unfortunately for Plett and illuminatingly for her readers he also says '"[This is] not understanding that the violence is the outcome of a consensus on the Palestinian side -to use violence in order to change the political situation." '

Now, reading that, can you blame the Israelis if they didn't want to sustain economically a people united in violence against them?

I say 'if', because one of few things which is undeniable, amidst all this cause and effect tail-chasing, is that the Israeli fence with bits of wall in it has reduced suicide bombings and attacks within Israel to virtually nil. So what was the purpose of that wall again? Ah yes, to make the Palestinians poor. The side-effect isn't a bad one though, is it?

Saddam Loving Celebrity Watchers

The BBC does its own version of Hello! magazine as Martin Asser speculates about Saddam's 'sylph-like' appearance and whether his daughter has had a 'tummy-tuck'. He also mentions rumours that Saddam is a long-term 'afficionado' of the Atkins Diet.

It's just disrespectful to the people who suffered under Saddam's regime to discuss him in these ways. It will make it difficult for the Iraqi courts to establish the right kind of seriousness and authority if international media like the BBC treat the despot with this kind of levity. There's little doubt that Saddam's biggest encouragements over the last sixteen months (and more) have come from the western media.

The Beeb seem to think that since Gen. Myers mentioned Saddam's weight loss and followed it with a comment about excercise it was the cue for them to go all girly magazine (doesn't take much urging for the lightweights at the Beeb). It ought to be obvious that there is a reason for mentioning Saddam's physical condition: the media's distrust of US treatment of prisoners. Asser avoids saying this.

The serious point just doesn't seem to register. Hysterically anxious one moment; unserious the next. The Beeb set one fine example.

Asser makes one or two interesting asides. One of them is to describe items for the weight-conscious that were ordered by Saddam's regime via the UN. He says unambiguously 'all purchases were blocked by the UN'- and seems to imply a much frostier relationship than we've heard about recently via people like Claudia Rosett. But then, the Beeb don't take that seriously, either.

One final thing; to refer to Saddam as 'Iraq's political strongman' as Asser does in his conclusion seems to be understating things badly. I hate to harp on, but the term 'strongman' was used in a broadcast by Orla Guerin in April this year to describe Ariel Sharon (I heard it with my disbelieving ears). There's no doubt that Saddam will use his sham elections to defend himself as the popular leader of Iraq in his coming trial. Do the BBC agree with this defence?

A Case In A point:

via LGF, this instance of BBC bias feels like a vindication of my case made below against the 'second major finding' of the Glasgow Media Group study-turned-into-a-book. It illustrates that if the BBC aren't yet satisfying leftist organisations like G.M.G., they are trying their best to do so. See if you can spot the point in the BBC report about Jordanian willingness to send troops to Iraq (hint- it relates to points C and D in my previous post) and then look at Charles' post for where 'The truth is exactly opposite to the way they describe it.' - as usual.

[Update: you won't be able to spot it as it's been stealth edited away! I'd call that their fault not mine, but sorry to anyone who was puzzled. What now reads 'The Jordanian people, many of whom are of Palestinian origin' used to read 'the Jordanian people, who are largely of Palestinian origin'. Not an easy error to make I think.]

I Know They're Wrong, prt 2

Glasgow Media Group's second of their major findings was that people were not informed by the news [media] about the history underlying Israel and the Palestinians. They seem to think this is bad for the Palestinians, and in their book quote people saying they'd like to support the Palestinians if they only understood them better.

Norm expresses the problem with this very modestly and nicely:

'Are we to suppose that the same viewers afflicted by these informational gaps all have an excellent knowledge of various circumstances not mentioned here: the establishment of the State of Israel on the basis of a UN resolution; this in the aftermath of the genocide against the Jews of Europe; the immediate declaration of war on Israel by the surrounding Arab nations, and their continuing hostility after that? I'm disinclined to believe that knowledge-gapped viewers somehow only have gaps in their knowledge that disfavour the Palestinian case, but are thoroughly on top of all the facts which might be placed on the other side of the balance.'

I'll defer to Norm as to the definitiveness of this list, but points I've also heard raised (which I note randomly, as befits my sketchy knowledge) are A)The treatment of Jews in Muslim lands during the holocaust; B)The reality of continuous occupation of the land of Israel by Jews for millenia to the present day; C)The ambiguous nature of the people group defined 'Palestinian'- as opposed to Jordanian; D)The previous 'occupation' of 'Palestinian' lands by Jordan and Egypt; E)The inception of the current 'occupation' as part of a war of self-defence.

- and there are probably many others I haven't mentioned. Of course they could be part of a smokescreen, and there are two sides to every story, but no-one can expect to have the story the way they want it every time, which is what the 'Palestinians' appear to want.

What the Glasgow Media Group are articulating here is not, it seems to me, a belief that by informing people properly through the news the Palestinians would get more support, but the desire to simplify the history sufficiently that we might have a clear sense that the Palestinians deserve our sympathy. Their chosen historical narrative leaves its own trail of ambiguities, which they ignore. They are then left lamenting the patchiness of their desired set of simplifications in media like the BBC.

It seems to me that the cry of 'simplification' is actually the heart of the problems with the media coverage of Israel today- a cry that the BBC would love to respond to but daren't do consistently. I'm of the opinion the issue of Israel and Palestine is neither simple nor fiendishly complex. It's not the preserve of academics but it's not for the casual observer either. I am fairly certain a real sense of history (and I might add, ethnicity, religion and geography) would mean the reverse of what G.M.G. intends would happen: we would staunchly support democratic Israel.

If you've warmed up with Paul Reynolds' insightful account of the Iraq transfer (see below), you'll be ready for an even more insightful one (warning: Michael Moore looms large in it).