The maverick climate-change deniers are examined in some detail by Brian Micklethwait at Samizdata. A good post, which addresses the concerns I had about the reliability of the documentary makers. Summary: who cares who made it if they spoke truth to power. Or, as Brian puts it:

"If a mad, not-to-be-trusted person says something true, there is still the matter of its truth to be considered. "

Generally speaking I would like to vote Conservative, but sometimes they've been too pathetic a shower to allow for it.

When Dave Cameron (yes, I'm still angry about the sacking of his shadow minister Mercer- see below post) was spouting his green credentials to the heavens recently I said to myself that sooner or later his judgement was going to be exposed on that issue. There's no way the reality matches the hysteria.

It looks as though that time has come sooner rather than later with the devastating documentary on Channel 4- The Great Global Warming Swindle- yesterday exposing the shallowness of global warming science. Dave could suffer serious credibility loss as this sinks in. Melanie Phillips has a grand summary up of the main points covered, so that even though I myself didn't see it I can tell how powerful the message was.

"The Great Global Warming Swindle has blown an enormous hole in every fundamental claim made to support the climate change obsession — including the claim that the argument is over."

Do read it all. Perhaps the most interesting thing for me is that it got made by Channel Four, maverick to the core it would seem.

What's left when this is right?

The Cameron bandwagon rolls on, and who cares if a little baggage falls off on the way?

Patrick Mercer, veteran high ranking officer of Bosnia and Northern Ireland, and MP close to my neck of the woods in the UK, just became inexpedient to his master Dave. Or rather he became another useful example to be made.

Dave really makes my blood run cold sometimes, and this is one of them. It is, of course, a rearranging of the deck chairs, but Cameron's contempt for a man's career and reputation is just awesome. That's as it's meant to be, I suppose.

Real impressive, Dave, you pampered little Etonian Oxbridge druggie. Check out the class dumping on show:

"The comments made by Patrick Mercer are completely unacceptable and I regret that they were made. We should not tolerate racism in the Army or in any walk of life. Patrick Mercer is no longer a Shadow Minister.”

Ooh err. How tough and hard and cruel that Dave is. Sexy!

Now, of course, Cameron is operating by certain rules of the game. You know, thou shalt be cool with the perceived moraes of the drifting mainstream, oriented towards that shrinking cohort of youth which everyone aspires to be cool with.

This is electorally smart but fundamentally foolish, if you aspire to actually do your country some good. For one thing there are clever and resourceful people who will not forget these kinds of bloodletting sacrifices to political correctness.

For another, unlike Dave, other people do live in a world that is not simply about deckchairs and their latest rearrangement. It's clearly true in Britain, and even more blatant elsewhere. There are people in Britain who cannot draw comfort from a label of minority, who are unable to follow the banal and emptied pieties of correctness, who can't make sense of it and who find the likes of Dave's mean media morality discouraging and depressing. If they don't raise their voices it's because it all seems way over their heads, and Dave obviously knows they can be safely ignored. Yet how safe is a cowed native populace?

Dave frets that Mercer compares army discrimination against blacks manifested in nasty names like "black bastard" with discrimination against redheads with nasty nicknames like "ginger bastard".

Dave, of course, is neither black nor ginger. I'd like to know exactly what makes him an expert on the feelings of black people, since he clearly wouldn't give a monkey's for the feelings of less seriously "different" sorts. I realise he's choreographed some trips in Africa, which isn't difficult when you have a political machine behind you. I don't know how qualified I am to comment, but I am red headed, have lived in- and adored- Africa, visited aids sufferers and slums, and dated several black ladies (in Europe) whom I respected and even could claim to have loved- so I do feel qualified, at any rate. Dave has also never been in the army. Dave merely pronounces.

Mercer was talking from experience. I don't expect he made anything up. Dave, meanwhile, is himself a piece of fabrication. He actually scares me: a puffed up piece of vanity propelling himself on a specious notion of power, a hydrogen balloon of pr. guff who will go off with a bigger pop even than Blair- and sooner. I once punched a guy who acted like Dave Cameron- probably the only decisive act of violence of my volition in my life. It felt great, and it was actually the right thing to do- which blew me away completely, and the other guy too.

What about Lord Black?

I wanted to link to this article by Mark Steyn because I have always been interested in Lord Black, since long before he was a lord. He made the newspaper world in Britain far more dynamic than it otherwise might have been. That dynamism is probably why it's so far ahead of its US rivals in adapting to the internet, and why, still, Britblogs are way behind the Dailies- with the exception of a certain Mr Fawkes.

Black lived it big, but not clever. If he'd been as cunning as most top execs he'd have been in a more lucrative business where hundreds of millions are available without the green-eyed onlookers prying in.

I also link to this article because it's a great read from a great writer.

And by the way, the Black story hasn't gone away yet, unlike his millions and his direct legacy.

A couple of interesting snippets, one from Mark Steyn's letters page:

The published total GDP of the entire 22 nations the Arab League in 2005 went to 1.05 trillion dollars and it only got to that point as a result of 60 plus dollar a barrel oil prices. Iran is not a member of the Arab League and their GDP was 352 Billion dollars so for all of these 23 nations, the total is well under 1 1/ 2 trillion dollars! Interestingly, to put that into perspective, Italy's total GDP for the same period was 1.765 trillion dollars. Now they have a nice agricultural background and a little bit of manufacturing and they are still way ahead of the entire Arab League.

And then there's this: Soros buys Halliburton. Surely a bit early for April Fool's? (via Samizdata)

Still, hypocrisy is in the air at the moment. One of the world's leading politicians with a reputation for not giving a damn about the environment has in fact taken great care to contradict that image- privately. I suppose the inverse of hypocrisy must be something quite opposite- such as modesty. I actually knew about Bush's enviro-friendly house three or four years ago, but I think it's indicative of the way "good news" about Bush has been communicated (by his administration) and received (by the media) that it is news only now.

Whereas one of the great nearly-men with a reputation for being very green-fingered has in fact been turning a carbon friendly red before the gaze of the world's media; that which can be bothered, anyway. (Thanks to Peter Glover for his great new site).

The booze is back in town...

Good news from Pajama clad Iraq the Model.

Islam vs...Robert Frost

A thought inspired by three unfortunate travellers (who will not be telling their stories years from now).















TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; 5

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same, 10

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back. 15

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference. 20

French Lesson

"The great lesson of this story is that nothing is set in stone – antagonisms that we believe are inscribed in marble are not eternal."

Indeed, Jacques Gilles. But must it not also follow that allies are not chiseled in stone either? EU Ref. is following the story of the Eurohistory boys.

Sorry for the absence of posts at the moment... I'm away this weekend and very busy, but I'll be back with more very soon.

Tricky language, English.

I came across a little item from Robin Aitken at BBC Radio 4's Today website, and the phrasing of its description, though unexceptional, amused me. Aitken's the man whose book is doubtless embarrassing all the right people at the Beeb. A video of his comments, filmed by Doughty St., can be seen at Biased BBC here. The item:


"Jackie Elliott
Robin Aitken's interview with Jackie Elliott before he was executed"

I can't remember anything about Jackie Elliott, but I think Aitken has so far survived Auntie's ire, so I suppose Elliott's a gonner and Aitken is merely in a critical condition.

"the prospect of a world that, if Maugeri is correct, can sustain itself indefinitely on fossil fuels—even as it pursues new forms of cleaner burning energy—is enough to drive many environmentalists, who have spent their lives combatting smog, absolutely batty."

Jeff Goldstein on the latest difficult reality for the "reality based" to swallow. Gulp.

Still playing cricket...

One has to admire the gentleness of the response a man like Robin Aitken to the BBC's endless provocations.

Wearing a white checked shirt and what looks like a pair of cords for his Evening Standard photo, Aitken, promoting a book, catalogues an extraordinary string of experiences had while doggedly retaining both right of centre political views and his job at the BBC. One feels that his forward defensive might be a joy to behold.

"From the sugar queues the police, army and Gezi youths go to the road blocks and from there to the scramble for fertilizer or the lines for maize meal. And everywhere you look the feeling is of the increasingly fragile hold on control. In this one week over 170 women from Woza were arrested for Valentine protests; teachers union leaders were arrested and 14 student union leaders were arrested. Seven years of misery are coming to a head."

Just the latest moving news from Zimbabwe.

An interesting possibility noted by Israellycool here

Do you recognise this face from anywhere?

"The Italian language is the language of song, German is good for philosophy and English for poetry. French is best at precision, it has a rigour to it. It is the safest language for legal purposes...The language of Montesquieu is unbeatable." - CPLDE leader Maurice Druon

The above quote comes from the latest salvo in a campaign to make French the sole language of law in the EU. (via Language Log)

I doubt very much that this is a good idea.

For one thing French was the language of diplomacy in part because its vagueness allowed for all those fudging compromises which glued together the fissiparous European peace (for a while).

For another, the extreme receptiveness of English has absorbed and adopted both French and Latin legalisms and created a virtual language within a language for use in legal contexts. It's made to measure, so to speak.

The problem could be that it's not made to measure for the EU- which is basically another of those relatively frequent admissions that the EU is a kind of greater France, a fulfillment of the Napoleonic fantasy. British English adapted a form specifically to cope with the realm of Common Law, and the Froggies think they've finally found a less sticky wicket to play on where they can promote their language without looking like nutcases (more or less).

Regarding the quote from M. Druon, "English for poetry"- I can't quite believe he means this, and not just because he's French. The man is certainly betraying his ignorance; there are approximately nine words to rhyme with that most central of poetry's abstract nouns, "love"

I suppose M. Druon would make us really the unacknowledged legislators of the EU, which would, no doubt, put us at the heart of Europe as well- metaphorically speaking.

To end on a serious note, in case it seems that this political fixing is just a joke, it's good to remember that the European Court of Justice already uses French as its working language, for no apparent reason other than its location in Luxembourg. From this irrational toe-hold, the French are apparently trying to get their whole foot in the door.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.

Breaking news from the BBC:

LATEST: Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov wins Turkmenistan presidential election. More soon. (ie. they'll tell us the rest of his name).

Interviewing Mr Klaus

The Czech President, Vaclav Klaus, is one of the few decent politicians on this planet:

"Q: Don't you believe that we're ruining our planet?•

A: I will pretend that I haven't heard you. Perhaps only Mr Al Gore may be saying something along these lines: a sane person can't."

Proof here

Wow- this is a fantastic way to start an article:


"The more I think about “global warming”, in light of the most recent United Nations report, the more confident I become in averring that it is a fraud, a political stunt, a criminal imposture, that every intelligent journalist should be helping to expose."

From the great David Warren- continue reading here. Think I'll go and read the rest now... [update: immensely well worth the time]

The Wise Consensus:

The DT's Farndale mulls Cameron's Eurostance via the fancies of Brian Walden:

"Tories who talk about withdrawal from Europe are wasting their energy and ensuring that their party will never be re-elected. They should accept that we are in Europe to stay. The deed is done. But he added this: if you don't like the idea of the EU, simply bide your time. Eventually its own internal contradictions and absurdities will make it implode."

That's a good example of how the British "thinking" classes are so completely letting down their nation. Do they really imagine that implosion of the EU would be painless for us, while we were inside? Is it in any way sensible to tie our medium term policies to an entity whose guarantees are likely to be acrimoniously voided? If this is in fact not the real view of the "thinkers", what kind of a unified Europe can be expected to emerge? More importantly, what kind of Britain would shape up to be a part of it (I think we already have part of the answer with increased- indirect especially- taxation, ID cards, surveillance cameras etc)?

The BBC and truth agree at last:


"Back to cold war?
By Rob Watson
BBC defence and security correspondent, Munich

The Munich security conference was born in the 1960s - the height of the Cold War. Forty years on, there been talk of a new chill"

Meanwhile, back in darkest Russia:

"The real news from Saint Petersburg -- demonstrated by cooling that is occurring on the upper layers of the world's oceans -- is that Earth has hit its temperature ceiling. Solar irradiance has begun to fall, ushering in a protracted cooling period beginning in 2012 to 2015. The depth of the decline in solar irradiance reaching Earth will occur around 2040, and "will inevitably lead to a deep freeze around 2055-60" lasting some 50 years, after which temperatures will go up again."