backword
Tuesday, 4 April 2006
Divers Late Night Confused Thoughts »
I’ve really come to hate tehgrauniad. I think that Comment is Free is doomed, but I’ve got no closer to articulating quite why than I have to rewriting this site.
Though, since you were kind enough to ask, the germ of what I think was posted on that blog heh, indeed.
But the “killer app” for news media organizations is, well, news. One reason why they’ve been shedding readers and viewers lately is that they’ve spent the last couple of decades cutting costs, spending less on foreign bureaus and reporting, instead emphasizing opinion and lifestyle journalism because it’s cheaper. The trouble is, everybody has an opinion, and a lifestyle. Not everyone can provide interesting and factual reports from far places. Opinion journalism puts you in competition with literally millions of bloggers. Actual news gathering does not.
And, god, that’s why so much of CiF is painful: there’s no research; posts would fail as undergraduate essays.
That goes for Professor Yay, too.
But I do think that Old Media are capable of adapting, if they have the will.
Is he is, or is he isn’t a believer in capitalism? “Old Media” is such a lazily defined concept that whatever happens can be taken as proof. “See, when I said the MSM wouldn’t see out the decade, what I had in mind was, in fact, the Minneapolis Times-Herald-Picayune.”
Michael White, whom I used to rather like, is absolute rubbish.
I spent five or six hours on the phones yesterday talking to Labour politicians. When I raised the Brown/Blair question most of them groaned. They want to talk about Labour’s campaign to hold as many seats as possible in the May 4 elections.
He’s been a lobby journalist for years, and now he’s talking on the phone to MPs with every reason to evade and lie. What happened to an expense account for lubrication? What happened to common sense? Well of course politicians want to talk about something else: they always do. If an MP climbs Big Ben with a Howitzer, the rest of his party will want to talk about how cheese production has gone up in their constituency.
Hardly surprising that. Votes are to MPs what sales or viewing figures are to the media, lifeblood.
No, Michael, they’re not. MPs are elected in general elections. Local elections will be held on May 4. Please Michael, pay attention, I know one of your friends wants to give you the figures for the results 31 days before the count, but you should listen to this. MPs are elected every four or five years. Between those campaigns, it’s pure gravy man. You make a film, and you worry about sales here, sales abroad, DVD, tv rights — sales are real, and each one decides if you pay your mortgage. MPs understand none of that. It’s not the same thing at all.
How do I know? Because I spoke to Mr Brown’s spokesman too — not Brown himself, of course …
And with that “of course”, Michael, I ceased to take you seriously.
There’s a very wise comment on Derek Draper’s reply by Daniel Davies:
On the other hand, does it seem even remotely likely that ministers would be really interested in a set of local government elections that are clearly totally f’cked no matter what, but not at all in a leadership battle that is clearly totally live? As far as I can see, neither Michael nor Derek have any real evidence beyond hearsay, but only one of them is asking us to believe something completely contrary to human nature.
Indeed (and heh and yay), I’ve started to see the role of columnists on tehgrauniad not as people on the spot, or people who were on the spot (as great newspapermen like the Telegraph’s Bill Deedes or tehgrauniad’s James Cameron were), but as secular preachers who tell us what we ought to believe, and do so more earnestly when their cause is improbable.
Martin Kettle’s role seems to be the husting agent in the cause for the dissolution of the people, especially quarrelsome Guardian readers. His piece on Italy inadvertently shows what I’ve long suspected about the US. The goverment is corrupt and risible; the country is prosperous and happy. They have lots of laws in Italy, and no one gives a damn. In the US, you’d be pressed to find a politician with views beyond taxation and abortion are bad, and Israel is good. Ask him to point to Israel on a map, lower taxation, or admit having sex, and you have the old Michael White problem.
Yet the real case against Berlusconi in my view is not that he is a scoundrel but that he has been a failure. History presented Berlusconi with opportunities to reform Italy that he not only failed to take but deliberately spurned. In one sentence, he put himself and not Italy first.
Am I really alone in believing that one should always put oneself first, and that there really is no other choice? Being in the world, Dasein if you will, comes at the price of great selfishness.
But enough of tehgrauniad, time to welcome back Michael Brooke, who posted on the hot topic of Online Libel over a fortnight ago.
God knows I’ve seen plenty of legal threats flying around in the eleven years or so I’ve been online. Indeed, I was even momentarily tempted to sue someone myself after he called me an anti-semite for voicing mild criticism of Ariel Sharon (I’d have had little difficulty demonstrating that it was professionally defamatory, given that I was trying to market an Anglo-Jewish film at the time) — but, in common with 99.9% of others in this situation, when push came to shove I realised that I just couldn’t be arsed.
Sadly this brings us straight back to CiF, to wit David Hirsh.
It would be transparently ridiculous for anybody to claim that criticism of Israeli policy is anti-semitic. Wouldn’t it?
Indeed it would. That hasn’t stopped very many people though. Try “It would be transparently ridiculous for anybody to claim that Hilter killed six million Jews”. Six million? How? Or “It would be transparently ridiculous for anybody to claim that the Red Sea parted and Moses led his people to freedom”. I think the former, though mind-boggling, is true and the latter is silly: but I’ve read books of history, and know a little of the viscosity of water; and I’m just about educated enough not to be thrown by asseverations of my ignorance.
Coming back to Martin Kettle, Harry’s Place has a sort of go at Zsuzsanna Clark with Say what you like about Stalin, but …. There’s the usual H’sP point missing: Russian Communism != Stalin, for one thing; for another, last time I was in Prague, in 1998, for the Marathon, the great Emil Zatopek, Communist Colonel and hero of 68, who started the race, was as feted as ever. (He died not long after.) Zatopek spoke several languages; his biography records him charming tables of journalists in French, German, or English. The McWhirter brothers, whose politics one could mildly describe as “right-wing” were admirers. He clearly had political opinions. He voiced them when the tanks came. But he didn’t leave.
Perhaps he had doubts. Perhaps he could not screw his courage to the sticking-point or let “I dare not” wait upon “I will” like the puir cat in the adage. He was only the only man ever to win gold medals at 5000m, 10000m, and the marathon in the same Olympics, and those events hurt.
Perhaps it wasn’t so bad. At least no worse that 50s Britain or 50s USA.
Oliver Kamm gets the best reply:
Well, obviously no one denies that crimes were committed under Communism: Bukharin confessed, didn’t he?
As did the Rosenbergs.
Quoting Oliver though reminds me of one thing where I have to admit I was wrong regarding the Iraq War. At the time I was rather fond of quoting:
Hurrah for revolution and more cannon shot!
A beggar on horseback lashes a beggar on foot.
Hurrah for revolution and cannon come again!
The beggars have changed places, but the lash goes on.
Now I think that this is more appropriate.
My country is Kiltartan Cross;
My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor.
No likely end could bring them loss
Nor leave them happier than before.
Amazingly, William Butler Yeats was an Irish Senator. That we should have such men now.
These 926 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 2:26am GMT Permanent link.
Monday, 10 April 2006
It's Political Correctness Gone Mad! »
Strange days in Wales. It’s about time that I not only wrote something here, but that I wrote about things which at least affect me a little. Anyway, while there are are a few decent bloggers in Cardiff, none of the ones I read have mentioned any of the following stories.
I could have blogged Police sorry for TV pundit gaffe last week, but details have, as they say, emerged since, which made me glad I didn’t. This hasn’t had a lot of coverage, despite its many good points: political correctness, bumbling cops, the change to display a photo of a blonde (ably taken up by the BBC here), and a journalist (journalists love to write about journalists).
North Wales Police have apologised to a journalist for wrongly accusing her of making offensive remarks on television.
I mean, it’s a story already. How can you be wrongly accused of making offensive remarks on TV? There are witnesses and usually recordings. But it seems that the North Wales police didn’t do the sensible thing which would be to interview the complainant, look for evidence, and if any is found, approach the accused.
Daily Mail columnist Allison Pearson received a letter from the force about a complaint that she referred to “little Welshies” during an appearance on BBC One’s Question Time.
But Ms Pearson, who is Welsh, did not appear on that particular programme.
I’m not a fan of Ms Pearson, and I wouldn’t have picked her out of an identity parade which otherwise featured The Queen, Woody Allen, Attila the Hun, Julius Ceasar, and Ned Kelly as the “Welsh One”. Still you live and learn. You live, anyway.
A police spokeswoman said they received a complaint from a member of the public regarding comments made by a female journalist on Question Time.
The complainant contacted the BBC and claimed to have been told the journalist concerned was Ms Pearson.
This still doesn’t reflect well on the police. So someone complains. But people make false claims all the time, either to harass other people or to fiddle their insurance. Surely the first recourse is at least to check the claim?
According to Murdoch on Sunday, [it was Cristina] Odone [who was] warned on ‘little Welshies’. I’m not an admirer of her either.
Her “anti-Welsh” comments came in a Question Time programme in late February. The panel was having a light-hearted discussion about whether Cardiff might host the 2012 Olympics if the London stadium is not built in time, in the same way that the Welsh capital is standing in for the unfinished Wembley stadium for football matches.
“The Welsh, I can tell you, are whooping it up already,” said Odone. “They are saying ‘We are going to have a whole English football extravaganza up here’. And from now on, they [the English] are not going to be talking about the ‘leeks’, and they are not going to be talking about the ‘little Welshies’. They are going to be saying ‘Excuse me, could we come in here, could we please?’ ”
But we — the Welsh (and I include myself in that, as I live here) — are “whooping it up”. And Ms Odone didn’t call anyone a “little Welshie” — she implied that others did. (I think she shows a characteristic tin ear for demotic abuse, but that’s not criminal, even in a journalist.)
A North Wales police spokeswoman admitted the force made a mistake, but added that it took anti-Welsh racial slurs seriously.
An outraged Odone said: “I think this is political correctness gone mad.”
For once, I think I agree with her.
However, Cardiff’s being home to the natural replacement for Wembley isn’t without its problems. Swans pair arrested over insults. (That’s Swans as in Swansea City, not as in bird flu.)
Swansea’s Lee Trundle and Alan Tate were arrested by police on Wednesday for taunting Cardiff City after Sunday’s Football League Trophy win.
…
South Wales Police have yet to officially charge either of the two players following a flood of complaints.
Trundle, captain Roberto Martinez and Tate brandished a flag bearing graphic insults aimed at Cardiff.
A lot of people complained, and this time the police seem to have looked at the evidence.
The BBC has a photo of Mr Trundle holding his half of the flag, which read “Off/diff”. Mr Tate’s half, should you need help with basic literacy, read “Fuck/Car”.
Trundle, who also wore a T-shirt which had a cartoon of a man urinating on a Cardiff shirt, has refused to comment on his actions.
Swansea chairman Jenkins said Trundle’s actions were inexcusable and believed it “could be something that Lee lives to regret”.
It’ll be a long time before the football fans I know stop talking about it. It’s not clear from the article, but they defended themselves initially by saying that the flag was thrown from the crowd, and they only saw the reverse (though it looks like the marker pen went right through the material). Mr Trundle’s T-shirt says something about pre-meditation, however.
What’s my point? If I have one, I know which of two arguably inflamatory phrases “Fuck off Cardiff” against “Little Welshies” (to try to make them comparable) is more likely to result in someone being put in hospital. So I’ve a lot more sympathy with the South Wales Police that their Gog colleagues. But then, I live in Cardiff, and many of my friends are Cardiff City supporters, so I’m biased too.
Oddly enough, because I don’t follow the beautiful game, I only heard about this when they were arrested, when I met a couple of friends in a pub down the road from where one is opening a shop. The other lives in Roath (pretty much “the student district"), and when he walked in, he said that there were lots of police along Albany Road. We weren’t sure whether to believe him, but he was right: Two arrested as roads sealed off.
Police have arrested two people after streets in the Roath suburb of Cardiff were sealed off for several hours.
Parts of Albany Road and Inverness Place were affected on Wednesday night, as officers searched commercial premises in the area.
There aren’t many commercial premises on Inverness Place. There’s a health food shop/deli, a women’s hairdresser’s, a second hand record shop, and opposite those, the delivery entrance to Tesco. I’m pretty sure from what I’ve heard that it was one of the shops on the opposite side of Albany Road to Tesco, anyway.
A police spokesman said the property had been secured and a search of it continued through the night.
About 20 police officers were called to deal with the incident, which began at about 1915 BST on Wednesday.
Around 100 yards of Albany Road from the junction with City Road was reopened to traffic just after 2100 BST, although police officers remained in the area.
There’s been no proper explanation since. Human smuggling? Terrorist cells? A plot by Cardiff City supporters to abduct Lee Trundle? We’ll never know.
These 709 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 9:49pm GMT Permanent link.
Tuesday, 11 April 2006
Blogs I Should Add »
Some men are brothers; the blog name is from DJ Enright and the pseudonym is from George Gissing, so clearly a man of erudition. And he links to me, so you can add taste.
Not Little England: hate this government as much as I do.
Indecent Left: great name. Uses the term “pseudo-left” which I normally despise, but I like who he applies it to.
The Horny Toad. Only one post so far, but it’s a good ‘un. C’mon Charles Clarke, why doesn’t your ID card protect against spots and cancer?
Steven Poole: the man all the other bloggers are talking about. Well, at least Oliver Kamm and Norman Geras are. The Prof describes him as “help[ing] himself to a couple of easy points": translation — the bastard hit a nerve.
Dave’s Part: great name and called a tosser by Nick Cohen.
These 142 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:26pm GMT Permanent link.
Saturday, 15 April 2006
The Group Who Sat Down In A Pub And Changed The World »
This is catch-up blogging. I’ve resolved not to post much (ie I vowed not to post at all, but I’m no good at promises) until I got the new engine up. However, I’m not going to post on the useless manifesto until comments are smooth. This is about something else.
Jim White in the Torygraph today meets Melvyn Bragg to discuss the latter’s “latest television series, 12 Books That Changed The World.”
But it is the anonymous contributors to another book that Bragg feels have had as dramatic affect on modern life. He argues that the group of Oxbridge graduates who sat down in a pub in Lincoln’s Inn Fields in 1863 changed the world as much as any scientist or politician the day they devised the Rules of Association Football.
“If people came back from 1862, the year before that book was written, to now, they’d look around and think, ‘What are these massive buildings? What goes on in them? What is this thing that fills our newspapers with news?’ And it’s not just here. Go to Scotland, Nicaragua, Argentina, increasingly China, it is massive everywhere. Then you find that 20 million women are playing, then you find it’s worth billions of pounds a year and that the men who play it are iconic figures, they set the fashions like Beau Brummell used to. Yes, it did change the world.”
I think the argument as Bragg (presumably) expresses it goes wrong somewhere. What he says as fact seems right.
Before the meeting of 1863, people played football, but to no pattern. There were folk games in villages, unruly tussles at Eastertide on heath and green; there were various marsupial developments in public schools, all played to arcane local regulations. It was only when the fledgling Football Association published their first set of universal rules that a coherent game emerged. It was a book the world seemed to be waiting for.
Yes, but what did the world make of the book? Here Bragg takes a wrong turn.
“It absolutely stunned me when I realised,” Bragg says. “These guys met in a pub, knocked these rules together and from that moment it was a sensational success. There’s been nothing like it. This was a game played by no more than 1,000 young men in England. Even then, it was different games. Half-time was introduced so that university men could play Eton rules one half, Rugby rules the next. Then it was standardised in this book and it went like a rocket.
I know that amongst his other accomplishments, Baron Bragg is a historian, but that “no more than 1,000 young men in England” feels wrong. There were a lot of villages in England in those days. It’s not that the world was waiting for football, but …
Not just round Britain, but British sailors took it round the world. They got off the boat and started playing it. Which is why the first teams in most countries — Le Havre in France, Genoa in Italy — were in ports.
I think there’s a better explanation here. What took off wasn’t the coats-as-goalposts kickabout; it became possible for teams who hadn’t played before to play together because the rules were simple enough to be easily agreed on. Therefore if you were a sailor from England and you found yourself in France, you could join in without being mugged by local (possibly ad hoc) rules.
And it only happened, he believes, because one day in 1863 a bunch of Victorian ex-public school boys sat down with a pen and paper in a London pub. “It’s true,” he adds, trying to catch a glimpse of the Emirates Stadium. “Thank God for the public schools.”
Baron Bragg is a Labour peer. ;-)
It’s a shame that Jim White’s other contribution to today’s Telegraph isn’t online (yet). In the arts section, he reviews Sir Alf: A Major Reappraisal of the Life and Times of England’s Greatest Football Manager by Leo McKinstry*. Like many good book reviews, it’s an entwining of the reviewer’s knowledge with an assessment of the book. Jim White comes across as a gentle soul in much of his writing, but he’s scathing about Sven-Goran Ericksson when he compares him to “the only manager — so far — to lead England to World Cup Victory.” I’ll spare the quotations, but it’s clear to me that Jim White thinks the Swede earns too much and delivers too little. However, it’s the final paragraph which I think is the most admirable. Not just for winding up the review so well, but for learning and thought worn lightly.
History is about image and, until now, Ramsey’s has been woeful. Incorruptible, loyal, utterly decent, he has nevertheless become the King John of English football. Meanwhile, someone like Bobby Moore — a sharp-tongued drinker and womaniser — has been post-rationalised into Richard the Lionheart, a paradigm of a kind of lost English sporting virtue. Leo McInstry’s book may be the first step in the old boy’s rehabilitation: 40 years on from that golden moment of English history, it is about time.
*I’m impressed with Mr McInstry’s oeuvre, which includes Fit to Govern: A Former Labour Activist Asks: Can Tony Blair’s Party Be Trusted to Run Britain?
Leo McKinstry sprang to prominence earlier this year when he wrote his resignation letter from the Labour Party in the form of an article in the Conservative magazine the “Spectator”. In this book, the former Labour Party researcher and Islington councillor, expands his article into an examination of the claims of Tony Blair’s Labour Party to be ready to form the next British government.
Clearly one I should have read.
These 399 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 6:59pm GMT Permanent link.
Putting Words Into Her Mouth »
Mike Power has already blogged on Stuart Jeffries’ interview with “leading feminist” Catharine MacKinnon. (Scare quotes because anyone tehgrauniad describes as a “feminist” could better be summed up by “nutter” and because “feminism” isn’t qualitative like the sciences — you know a leading scientist, they’re the ones whose predictions are right more often than the others; your good feminist gets a name by shooting gay male artists.)
Jeffries is very careful not to antagonise Dr MacKinnon: he doesn’t introduce himself as the author of Mrs Slocombe’s Pussy (when I’d have thought that “Hey, I’m an author too!” was the perfect icebreaker).
We are sitting in a 15th-floor hotel cafe overlooking London. I suffer from vertigo and so MacKinnon has kindly suggested that I sit facing her rather than the plummet to my death. But I still feel dizzy from confronting the chasm that she has opened up in the relations between men and women. If I have ever felt affirmed by aggressive initiation of sexual interaction (and I doubt this), I will not today. I’d prefer smelling salts. MacKinnon, by contrast, looks a little like Tippi Hedren and seems vexingly imperturbable and more sartorially put together in her green silk trousers and other designer duds than anyone who has just flown across the Atlantic to publicise a book has a right to be.
I suspect he’s overdoing the “I’m not a threat” thing. (Sadly for his conceit, Ms Hedren didn’t work for Hitchcock (dread phallocentric name!) until The Birds (dread sexist term!) (1963).)
However, Mike didn’t mention the bits which interest me.
Some have put words in her mouth — notably the claim that she thinks all heterosexual intercourse is rape: she does not.
No sources are given; and Dr MacKinnon’s detractors here seem as likely to be emancipated female post-docs as Fathers for Justice. So I’d welcome even a cursory examination of the claim. Mr Jeffries, perhaps without realising it, gives some grounds further on in the interview.
Women are so unfree that even if a woman is shown to have given consent to sex, that should never be enough to secure an acquittal.
If an antediluvial judge proclaims (as one, whose name I have forgotten, has) that when women say ‘no’ they often mean ‘yes’ is offensive (and I believe that it is), then surely Dr MacKinnon’s claim that when women say ‘yes’ they often mean ‘no’ is also. Mike quotes Anthony Daniels:
On every page an imprecise thought is expressed with a maximum of infelicity.
MacKinnon is good on imprecision.
Otherwise, she contends, unenlightened men still write the laws. And when, for instance, they write laws on rape they make what she believes are grotesquely sexist assumptions. “The assumption,” she says, “is that women can be unequal to men economically, socially, culturally, politically, and in religion, but the moment they have sexual interactions, they are free and equal. That’s the assumption — and I think it ought to be thought about, and in particular what consent then means. It means acquiescence. It means passivity. You can be semi-knocked out. You can be dead in some jurisdictions.”
I almost choke on my mineral water. Dead and giving consent? “Sex with a dead body is necrophilia but it isn’t regarded as rape.” Oh, I see. “You can be semi-comatose, not to mention married in many places, and be regarded as consenting whenever sex takes place.”
She’s lost the idea of being human as an important consideration. Necrophilia may be unpleasant, but no one gets hurt. If I could wave a magic wand which would turn every rapist into a necrophiliac (or a least a sheep worrier), I’d do it. (Well, I’d worry about it quite a lot actually, thinking specifically of the domestication of Alex at the end of “A Clockwork Orange” but you know what I mean, I hope.) She seems to have missed the idea that some ideas may well be orthogonal in conceptual space. Some people have power on some axes: that says nothing about scalar values of power on others.
I think Dr MacKinnon is trying to argue that romantic love is the only reason for a woman to drop her knickers.
“My view is that when there is force or substantially coercive circumstances between the parties, individual consent is beside the point; that if someone is forced into sex, that ought to be enough. The British common law approach has tended to be that you need both force and absence of consent. …”
But “substantially coercive circumstances” seems very slippery to me. “So, … what attracted you to millionaire/President …” Now I agree if someone offers a junior employee career advancement in exchange for sex that that’s sexual harrassment. However, that also applies to same sex coercion (which doesn’t seem to bother MacKinnon). And it’s a truth universally acknowledged that women are attracted to powerful men, so perhaps Ms Lewinsky didn’t need any coercion.
I don’t see how Dr MacKinnon’s ideas could be incorporated in law.
Lawyer: Mrs X…
Ms X: That’s Ms
Lawyer: you’ve, ahem, made several claims of rape against your former husband.
Ms X: that’s correct.
Lawyer: but you had three children with him.
Ms X: yes, but that was before I realised that I hated his guts. As I hate his guts, I couldn’t properly have consented to sex with him, could I? I may have said yes at the time, but viewed objectively, I realise that I meant no.
I don’t know what feminism should be. IMO, it should at least acknowledge gay and lesbian sex, and understand that sex without men, and without women is possible. And if these relationships are unhappy (as relationships often are), then this may not be the fault of gender, but of individuals. And it should acknowledge that adult women are adults, and they’re not all the same: Dr Condoleezza Rice is a good deal more powerful than most women. Powerlessness is real; but it’s got a lot to do with class first. Sort that out, and maybe we’ll get somewhere.
I’ve no intention to defend rapists. But a bit of rumpy-pumpy with the accounts manager after a bottle of voddy really isn’t the same as being raped at gun point or having your hymen broken by a lecherous uncle or step dad at 8. What we need is subtlety and definition. Lumping everything together hurts the real victims, and there are plenty of those.
I’ve one more bone to pick with Mr Jeffries.
There is no chance of her discussing with me her intriguing relationship with former professor of Sanskrit Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, to whom she was engaged for years. He reportedly once described her as “God”, which must have been nice. Masson had trained as a psychoanalyst and became project director of the Freud Archives, but was removed after setting out a heretical view about Freud and child abuse. According to his website, Masson now has a wife and family and writes books called Dogs Never Lie About Love, Elephants Weep and the Pig Who Sang to the Moon, about the emotional lives of animals. I may be wrong, but I don’t imagine they clutter MacKinnon’s night stand.
Jeffrey Masson’s books on Freud are excellent.
These 632 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 9:38pm GMT Permanent link.
Monday, 17 April 2006
They've Taken Over The Beeb »
It may be a lot of horned helmets, dragons, and magic gold to you, but it’s clearly an attempt by Hamstead to control our minds!
I’ve been listening most of today. (My cat is hiding in the garden.) The whole thing in one day really is too much. Mistake or not (Daniel Barenboim sensibly recorded it at Bayreuth, over the traditional four days), it’s an experience, and for a while you can believe that human culture peaked over a century ago. I think my brain is mostly mush by now.
These 90 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 9:11pm GMT Permanent link.
Dr Who Returns »
Doctor Who really is very fine. It doesn’t hurt that the Gower peninsula overlooked New New York or that the hospital foyer was actually the Millenium Centre (outside which the Tardis parked when it visited Cardiff in the last season; he does get about).
The Russell Davies/David Tennant commentary (which was broadcast on digital with the BBC3 repeat, but could also be used as a podcast along with a tape of the episode) is fun too. As in the last series the Doctor is fallible, in Davies’ reading (or my interpretation of same). He says that it all went wrong for Cassandra when all the other beautiful people wouldn’t help and drifted away, so chalk that up as the Doctor creating problems for himself by meddling. Still, a beautiful ending, and lot more emotionally powerful than the usual “and they all got back inside their time machine and went somewhere else.”
Like much good science fiction, the story may have been a metaphor for something, without being entirely clear what. (Animal experimentation? Human cloning?)
The cybermen are back in episode 5 it seems.
A splendid weekend for the BBC.
These 189 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 9:55pm GMT Permanent link.
The US Is A Foreign Country »
They do things differently there. BBC: Ex-US governor convicted of fraud.
George Ryan, the former governor of the US state of Illinois, has been found guilty of racketeering and other serious corruption charges.
…
Prosecutors said the 72-year-old steered state contracts and leases, worth as much as $25m (£14m) deal, to his friends and political insiders.
In return, he received vacations in Jamaica, Cancun and Palm Springs and gifts ranging from a golf bag to $145,000 in loans to his brother’s business.
US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald said Ryan’s actions represented “a low-water mark of public service”.
FBI investigator Robert Grant said the verdict emphasized that no-one was above the law.
Gotta love America. Only the Scotsman reports the news this side of the pond: Blair on the rack over cash-for-peerages puzzle. I love this paragraph:
Nick Bowes, Labour’s former head of high-value fundraising, alleged on a website that Number 10 was “running a party within a party - Blair, Lord Levy, Matt Carter and chairman Ian McCartney were all complicit in the scam, and I knew absolutely nothing about the loans”.
Labour had a “head of high-value fundraising"? WTF? And he fingers Ian McCartney? Scotland Yard could give Mr McCartney a torch, a complete set of Ordnance Survey maps, and three hours to find his own arse, and still be disappointed.
And where is Ruth Kelly? Is she spending even more time praying or what? Aren’t these city academies on her watch? She’s gone awfully quite. Poor dear. Nor have we heard from advisor John Birt. These great minds, and greater yaps, have fallen silent, like the guns on the Western Front on Christmas Day, 1914. Whatever can be the matter?
These 136 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:14pm GMT Permanent link.
Tuesday, 18 April 2006
In Broken Images »
“Is he one of us?”
Margaret Hilda Roberts Thatcher, quoted by Hugo Young
I’ve seen a fair bit a snide employed against critics of, for example, the Useless Manifesto. Jackie D in Matthew Turner’s comments is as articulate as they come:
As fun as it is to make fun of leftists and other fans of the state, I think it’s even funnier coming from someone who mostly just takes the piss and never really says anything about what they personally believe about various issues.
Elsewhere, leftist defenders of the useless say, in effect, “We have an ideology, nyah”. But having an ideology may be the problem. If it’s true that Matthew would rather just take the piss, then that’s fine by me. Jamie remembers that many of the ideologically correct were “tankies” — and still they evangelise and harangue like second hand car salesmen on commission.
So let’s have, as a preamble, some Robert Graves.
He is quick, thinking in clear images;
I am slow, thinking in broken images.He becomes dull, trusting to his clear images;
I become sharp, mistrusting my broken images.Trusting his images, he assumes their relevance;
Mistrusting my images, I question their relevance.Assuming their relevance, he assumes the fact;
Questioning their relevance, I question their fact.When the fact fails him, he questions his senses;
when the fact fails me, I approve my senses.He continues quick and dull in his clear images;
I continue slow and sharp in my broken images.He in a new confusion of his understanding;
I in a new understanding of my confusion.
No ideology; only broken images (it’s in the Bible and The Wasteland) and taking the piss (not in the former) here.
These 120 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:23am GMT Permanent link.
Rhetorical Question Of The Day »
Telegraph:
Does the Government know what it is doing?
Is the NHS being led towards disaster?
Short answer: yes of course. It’s the government.
As it emerges that some GPs are earning as much as £250,000 a year while NHS hospitals across Britain face heavy cuts and closures owing to financial pressure, Tony Blair has defended his management of the health service.
He said that waiting lists had been cut and new hospitals built under Labour, adding: “Sometimes we need the trip down Memory Lane just to notice we are now in Progress Street”.
The people whose jobs are cut didn’t earn all that much; if they donated to the Labout Party, it was probably only membership and the odd tenner. Doctors earning serious money (paid by the taxpayer) will be sensible fellows and realise that this largesse is political and lend a few bob to the People’s Party as a mark of gratitude.
Great minds think alike dept: Owen quotes Neil Kinnock’s 1983 speech.
If Margaret Thatcher is re-elected as prime minister on Thursday, I warn you.
I warn you that you will have pain— when healing and relief depend upon payment.
I warn you that you will have ignorance— when talents are untended and wits are wasted, when learning is a privilege and not a right.
I warn you that you will have poverty— when pensions slip and benefits are whittled away by a government that won’t pay in an economy that can’t pay.
I warn you that you will be cold— when fuel charges are used as a tax system that the rich don’t notice and the poor can’t afford.
I warn you that you must not expect work— when many cannot spend, more will not be able to earn. When they don’t earn, they don’t spend. When they don’t spend, work dies.
I warn you not to go into the streets alone after dark or into the streets in large crowds of protest in the light.
I warn you that you will be quiet— when the curfew of fear and the gibbet of unemployment make you obedient.
I warn you that you will have defence of a sort— with a risk and at a price that passes all understanding.
I warn you that you will be home-bound— when fares and transport bills kill leisure and lock you up.
I warn you that you will borrow less— when credit, loans, mortgages and easy payments are refused to people on your melting income.
If Margaret Thatcher wins on Thursday—
— I warn you not to be ordinary
— I warn you not to be young
— I warn you not to fall ill
— I warn you not to get old.
I’m not sure what Owen’s point is. (Update: I just realised that his post was written last year, when I Googled for Kinnock's speech, the date on the results page was 16 April, so I assumed that it was occasioned by a similar story. My bad.) Some of Kinnock’s predictions were wrong. ("I warn you that you will borrow less…") some were prescient ("I warn you that you will have defence of a sort --€“with a risk and at a price that passes all understanding.") And the last two “— I warn you not to fall ill/— I warn you not to get old” fits Margaret Thatcher’s self-appointed heir all too well.
These 159 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:19am GMT Permanent link.
The Perils Of Ignoring Bloggers »
The blogosphere is aflame! They’re talking here, they’re talking there. Who or what is the subject of such interest? Kevin Ray Underwood (or sometimes just “Kevin Underwood"). I’d never heard of him before (he’s an alleged cannibal), but bloggers can’t be wrong. I thought anthropophagy had suffered a decline since the misfire of the remake of “Red Dragon” but as Gene so rightly says:
Next thing you know, it’s one of the leading topics on the blogosphere.
If Kevin Ray Underwood eats anyone, this blog will let you know.
Tim Ireland warns the nasty old MSM (mmm, chocolate!) to pay attention to bloggers. In which case, I really do have to say labour blair and vote labour.
Apparently, elsewhere bloggers are discussing Nick Cohen and it’s easy to see why,
DRINK YOUR CLOTHES OFF: Put on your skivvies and check out Boudoir Bar’s Friday night bash, deejayed by Nick Cohen. Fans of the lingerie-themed lounge already include Prince, Kimora Lee Simmons, Mischa Barton, Queen Latifah, Mary-Kate Olsen and Kelly Osbourne. (127 Eighth Ave.)
Via the indecent mail list.
These 123 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:56am GMT Permanent link.
Wednesday, 19 April 2006
Friends »
Via I hope you get cancer, I learn that Teh Manifesto has a new supporter. I don’t know if I can resist much longer. She asks:
Will any Democrat politicians in America sign on?
Though she hasn’t signed herself, which must be a relief for some. There’s only so far you can go with whiny liberals, as here.
A number of flippant liberals are e-mailing me now with calls for all Filipinos to be interned. Grow up. The safety of the president and the country was put at risk, and it may have been due in part to the blinders of political correctness and complacency. If it means now that the White House will be applying extra scrutiny to naturalized Americans of Filipino descent working at the top levels of government and in the military, well, yes, I support that. It’s obviously overdue. And, as I argued in my last book, it’s just one small step towards the kind of national security profiling we should have introduced aggressively after 9/11. But didn’t.
Yes, indeedy. TWAT requires racial profiling, and you can’t trust those Filipinos. It’s the eyes, I think.
But it’s not just naturalised Americans we have to watch. Look carefully at the ID card here. It says, “FREE RIDE FOR LIFE.” If you know anyone who looks like the smiling lady, report him or her to the police, they’re bound to have done something wrong.
These 114 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 6:17pm GMT Permanent link.
My Birth Lord »
Chris Lightfoot has posted, for the first time in ages, it seems, on Lording it up. And the latest “blog” craze (daddy-o) is find your birth lord — a member of the Upper House who shares your birthday.
Chris has Jack Cunningham.
I’ve got Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood who is a cross bencher (I blame the 60s). I’m very impressed with his performance.
- Has spoken in 0 debates in the last year — 546th out of 724 Lords.
- Has received answers to 0 written questions in the last year — 220th out of 724 Lords.
- Has attended 0% of votes in parliament — 683rd out of 724 Lords. (From Public Whip)
- People have made 0 comments on this Lord’s speeches — 15th out of 724 Lords.
- 0 people are tracking whenever this peer speaks — email me whenever Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood speaks .
- Has used a three-word alliterative phrase (e.g. “she sells seashells") 0 times in debates — 654th out of 724 Lords.
- Has ended a sentence with ‘with’ 0 times in debates — 330th out of 724 Lords.
Of course, if it turns out he’s actually dead, and not just extremely lazy, I’ll consider that cheating.
These 81 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 7:18pm GMT Permanent link.
Thursday, 20 April 2006
Something Worth Supporting »
Renew your passport in May if you don’t want to be on the ID card database. In the future, we’ll probably have to sign oaths of allegiance every bloody week, but let’s at least try to hold out as long as we can.
Via Stephen Pollard: something not worth supporting. I won’t sign anything called “The People’s” (unless it’s clearly intended ironically) or which mentions “the silent majority”. Nixon and Mao, those great friends of freedom, united at last. You’ll find me elsewhere. (Let’s rename Sellafield “The People’s Nuclear Reactor”. Lord Levy can be “The People’s Fundraiser.” Martin McGuinness can be “The People’s Thug.” This could catch on.)
Via Tim Worstall’s comments, I’ve found yet another sound blogger, Martin Kelly. He may describe his writing as “right-wing rants” and worse “from the West of Scotland”, but he’s good (if hardly original) on NeoCons and the Blue Bolsheviks, which may explain why, to the ire of Andrew Regan, many persist in seeing the Euston Manifestation as “neo-con.”
Marc Mulholland, posting again after a long rest, says, “I luuuurve democracy, I haaate The Guardian. Bloody Hell!”
These 185 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 6:29pm GMT Permanent link.
Friday, 21 April 2006
Bloggers For Labour »
After a couple of days digestion, I’ve decided that Dave the Chameleon really is brilliant.
I’ve been thinking about the name change though. Alexander Douglas-Home (Con) was more often known as ‘Alec.’ He was succeeded Edward Heath, commonly referred to as ‘Ted’. He, in turn, gave way to “that woman” whom the press and just about everyone called “Maggie.” Our beloved Prime Minister’s predecessors were Neil Kinnock (Neil can’t really be any shorter), Michael Foot, James Callaghan (sometimes known as “Jim” or “Sunny Jim” or “Big Jim"), and Harold Wilson. Dave seems to be following Tory tradition, as does Tony Blair.
Oh, and Dave went to an expensive school. As did Tony Blair. And he says what he thinks people want to hear, but under it all he’s blue. Well, who brought all the focus groups to Number 10, eh?
I love the bit where it says that Dave “suddenly realised that telling everyone what the Conservatives really stood for was never going to make them, or more importantly him, popular”. That’s why a Labour PPB for the local elections (where David Cameron isn’t standing) is a patronising animation.
Tim Worstall gets a Times piece: In Praise of Charles Clarke.
Via Bloggerheads, Crooks and Liars: Henny Penny, the sky is falling. Donald Rumsfeld on the press coverage of the putative Iran invasion plan: “Henny Penny, the sky is falling”. Donald Rumsfeld on reports of violence or chaos in Iraq: “Henny Penny, the sky is falling”. As we know, there is no violence or chaos, or indeed bloody civil war in Iraq.
Looks like Polly Toynbee can’t wait to tell us all how much she earns. I wonder if she can understand a difficult word, like ‘as’:
As it’s a rollicking, absurd farce, it has very little indeed to do with real politics.
I suppose real politics isn’t rollicking. I don’t recall seeing even a French farce with such blatant cocksucking either.
I get the impression that Comment is Free is doomed. Surely even tehgrauniad can’t stand such derision much longer. I now only read those pieces I think it’ll be good to laugh at. Sorry, D2, you’re much too sensible.
These 345 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 6:37pm GMT Permanent link.
Sign Up, Sign Up, For Jesus »
I’m a little late with this, but TBogg brings news of another convert to the “progressive left” of the Euston Manifestation. If you check the link, “Michelle Blanchard” is also known as “Miss Carnivorous.” Penitents are invited to absolve themselves from leftist crimes by denouncing their past misdemeanors and associates and praising the Great Leader. Here’s Ms Blanchard:
I stand behind the principles stated in this manifesto. The authors of this manifesto are progressives in the true sense of the word. There can be no room for compromise on the basic issue of human rights, you are either for human rights, or you are against them. You can not pick and choose amongst the governments of the world and make exceptions for those governments that do not protect their citizen’s rights because you think that they are giving George Bush what for and you admire them for it. I am often frustrated by the hypocrisy of the left in America in not upholding it’s own basic principles. The left holds Americans to the highest standards but makes exceptions for the rank brutality of many third world dictators and dooms millions of third world citizens to lives of abject misery. This manifesto reestablishes the highest principles of the left cleary and succinctly.
And here’s the progressive Ms Blanchard.
Every time a wild animal attacks a human, the powers that be make ridiculous pronouncments about the incident. In the way that the media pretends that homeless people are not dangerous to the public, they downplay the danger of wild animals to humans.
First, they came for the homeless …
Pictured: a homeless person lurks in the crepuscular gloom, waiting for innocent white Republican virgins. Note the bare feet, a sure sign of criminality, and the horns, which is why Muslims always cover their heads.
These 107 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:38pm GMT Permanent link.
Saturday, 22 April 2006
Compare And Contrast »
Exhibit A[1]:
Then there has been the theme that, since [I] and supporting signatories include well-known journalists like […], the claim that our broad viewpoint has been under-represented in the liberal media is silly. Speaking loosely, it requires only a single half-asleep brain cell to deal with this point. The under-representation claim is a general one about the coverage by the relevant media of some major issues of political division within left and liberal opinion in recent times. It is, as such, an empirical claim, and to cite two or three names doesn’t begin to resolve it.
Exhibit B[2]:
However he did write the words, “We must be aware of the enormous control over every form of mass media the Jews possess and… who are the real manipulators of political power.”
One is claiming media repression against their “silent majority” and the other is … claiming media repression against their “silent majority”. “They” or if you will “les autres” “sont contre nous” — to paraphrase S Beckett: “Les Batards!"[3]
1 http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2006/04/platform_one.html
2 http://timesonline.typepad.com/david_aaronovitch/2006/04/archive_hour_in.html
3 The bastard! He doesn’t exist!
That’s the funny thing about the media: whichever side you’re on, it’s against you. After the revolution, well ho ho ho (trans: eat lead motherfuckers). Until then, we’ll curse, and stamp our dainty little feet, and whine, and whine, and whine.
These 93 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:36am GMT Permanent link.
Land Of The Free »
Bastard BBC: Hu heckler on harassment charge. Poor President Hu, and thank the maker for the speedy defence of American law. I look forward to the day when everyone like Hu can be protected by American law — with nuclear weapons if necessary. As the great Norm says, “Hooray, hooray for American democracy!” Oh such happiness. Freedom demands that she be boiled and shipped to Gitmo. (Full length apologia from Eve Garrard to follow.) Bush is great.
These 77 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:19am GMT Permanent link.
Sam On Dave »
The splendid Sam Leith considers the Labour PPB. He’s a little late, because it has gone to a better place. “This chameleon is no more! He has ceased to be! ‘E’s expired and gone to meet ‘is maker!”
They can’t decide whether the Tory leader is a classic, foaming, frothing at the mouth, tax ‘em and hang ‘em and flog ‘em and privatise ‘em and then send ‘em home on the first banana boat back to Bongo Bongo Land Tory bastard, or whether he is a flip-flopping focus-group weasel who’ll do anything to get a vote. Instead of thinking, right, what we need to do is figure out which one he is and then attack him for it, they’ve thought, sod it, we can’t be bothered. Let’s say both things at once. If the public are idiotic enough to vote for us, surely they’ll be idiotic enough to swallow the notion of a multicoloured blue chameleon.
Sam’s come to the same conclusion as me: convictions (and not just the sort George O’Dowd has for drug possession) are a bad thing.
Think, of history’s great conviction politicians: Mao, Pol Pot, Castro, Pinochet, Lenin, Tony Benn… Now try to think of non-conviction politicians, the dull, consensus-led creatures of focus groups. I can’t think of too many, either. They tend to preside over dull and peaceful regimes, and melt back into history unthanked and unhated.
Would it be such a bad thing, then, if someone set about trying to win an election by giving the people what they wanted?
You can still see Dave the Chameleon, although the original site seems to have lost the little video. Now it looks like this:
Comment is, as they say, superfluous.
These 92 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:20pm GMT Permanent link.
Sunday, 23 April 2006
Backing Blair »
He’s great. You really must vote Labour, if only to help Blair stay in power. Now he thinks that “the legal and political establishment” is “out of touch”. (Hot news, lawyer Blair is not a member of either, apparently.) Good for him. For the record, he addressed these comments to Observer journalist Henry Porter. What he says to say, Lord Falconer, may be another matter. Though only a cynic (ie me) would suspect that TB alters his message for different audiences.
He outlines controversial new steps, ranging from seizing assets from suspected drug dealers — which could see anyone stopped with more than £1,000 having the money confiscated — to draconian new restrictions on the movements of those suspected of involvement in organised crime.
Did anyone else watch Wednesday’s The Apprentice? What surprised me was the eagerness of flat letting agents to take cash. Now flats in London are let at £250 a week; a month down a month deposit is still normal terms. So I say to any ambitious policemen: 1) Find a nice expensive letting agent. 2) Place yourself between it and the nearest cashpoint. 3) Stop any person walking between the two. If they’re carrying a lot of money, like £2,000, ask them why. Don’t accept obvious lies like they’re trying to rent a place to live. Just arrest them.
Blair isn’t out of touch with crime of course. And we all know why. Care to do anything about suspects of involvement with organised crime in the cabinet, Tone? Or are we only talking about Jamaicans and Albanians? Not that I think you’re racist scum, Tone, just asking. How about a sensible crackdown on money laundering? May I suggest that suspects be barred from holding public office?
Lord Steyn as quoted by Henry Porter shows how out of touch he is by critising “lesser (though all too real) violations of human rights which are closer to home” rather than “other violations that are flagrantly worse.” See the Euston Manifestation for a clear cut guide to telling goodies from baddies.
These 300 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:12pm GMT Permanent link.
Tuesday, 25 April 2006
Aaro By 43 Seconds »
Via Mike Power, tehgrauniad’s Martin Kelner finds the London Marathon painful.
He is followed by a woman whose child has muscular dystrophy and is not expected to survive for too long, talking about how she started training to build up strength for the challenges to come, notably looking after her son when he has to use a wheelchair. Even the “personality” runners like Adrian Chiles and Zoe Salmon have disarming tales to tell about their personal challenges; and besides they are using their semi-celebrity to raise money for unimpeachably good causes.
I don’t actually know who Zoe Salmon is, but she did finish (in 5:31:27) as did Adrian Chiles (3:59:42) which is more than Jade Goody did. The BBC have revised their London Marathon Photos, which was how I knew she was in the race: she’s pictured at the front of the mass start. tehgrauniad seems to have attracted a fair number of misogynist snobs who aren’t happy about something to the news blog, perhaps “Arblemarch” says it all:
I’d be lucky to manage 18 inches!
As would we all, dear. Chance would be a fine thing, etc.
The look from TV chef Gordon Ramsay said it all. When Jade Goody, interviewed before she started yesterday’s London marathon, said she’d done little training and hadn’t swapped her curries for carbo-fuelled bowls of pasta, you didn’t need to be a genius to know what Ramsay was thinking — it’s going to hurt and it’s going to hurt bad, writes London marathon veteran Liz Ford.
I quite like Jade Goody. She’s fairly daft, but so are the great majority of people. Gordon Ramsay has a full-time job with anti-social hours yet he managed 3:46:10 which is pretty respectable.
Which brings me to the battle of the journalists. David Aaronovitch ran for The Anthony Nolan Trust and finished in 4:24:12. The Torygraph’s Jim White entered the Tresco Marathon (also held on Sunday).
This year with the support of a host of celebrities, namely Tina Baker, Mark Richardson, Blake Morrison, Bill Bryson, Jenny Agutter, Alan Hinkes, Dr David Bull and Charlie Dimmock, the Tresco Marathon event ran smoothly. At last the weather was kind!
Again, I don’t know who half of those people are. I won’t say which half though. Jim White managed to write a full length article Agonies of a middle-aged marathon runner in time for Monday’s paper, which was faster than the results went online: he ran 4:24:55, so while Whitey won the battle of the scribes rushing to print, Aaro edged him over 26 miles.
I was more interested in the sharper end of the field. My friend Gareth Thomas ran something of a blinder in 2:31:22, and, like Moses, came fourth in the over 40s. (I’m not sure how far down prize money goes in age categories, but I’m bound to find out.)
If anyone impressed me in the elite field, it was Stefano Baldini, the Olympic champion, who didn’t stay with the early pace, but gradually moved through the lead group to finish fifth in 2:07:22 or 41 seconds behind winner Felix Limo: less than the Aaronovitch-White gap.
The links to times may not be permanent. They seem to be database calls, though I can’t see why they don’t just use race numbers, which are unique. OK, I know that the elite athletes wear their names these days, but that doesn’t stop them being assigned numbers for administration purposes.
These 378 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:32am GMT Permanent link.
Evading Ministerial Responsibility »
Today’s Snowmail is simply splendid.
You couldn’t make it up. The Home Office has managed to free over a thousand foreign prisoners from British jails who should have been considered for deportation at the end of their sentences.
Five are murderers, nine are rapists, thirty nine are sex offenders — five of THEM are paedophiles and two hundred and four of the rest are guilty of violent crimes. No-one is resigning least of all the Home Secretary, to whom we shall be speaking tonight.
Of course it was the Tories who set up the agencies that run things like prisons and immigration and guess what? It was the Labour Party who said that the Tories had set up these agencies in order to evade ministerial responsibility when things went wrong.
Well things have gone wrong and they have gone wrong in the agencies of both immigration and prisons. So, are the heads of either of those organisations resigning?
Certainly not. But the Home Office Secretary Charles Clarke has said in the end blame does rest with the agencies, although he’s not actually blaming them. So is he resigning?
Well I don’t expect it to happen on Channel 4 News tonight…
The great man himself, no less. The dwindling band of Labour supporters want to know what ex-members like me would like to be different. Sticking to pre-election principle (even if it wasn’t ever quite policy) would be a good start. These agencies were always a bad desperate idea, as Labour realised at the time. If anyone’s looking to me to suggest a good PR gesture — they can take those bloody gates on Downing Street down.
Via Matthew Turner, the BBC has more Foreign criminals ‘not deported’.
Charles Clarke has not blamed the media so far.
These 101 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 7:06pm GMT Permanent link.
Best Year So Far »
From Beau Bo D’Or, via Guido.
These 7 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:09pm GMT Permanent link.
Wednesday, 26 April 2006
Against Law »
Independent MP Peter Law has died.
Veteran Labour Party activist, Peter Law, stood as an Independent in Labour’s safest Welsh seat and overturned a twenty thousand majority in protest against the imposition of an all-women shortlist.
26 years after the UK elected its first woman Prime Minister, the Labour Party insisted on all-women shortlists. Women MPs, with honourable exceptions like Clare Short, Glenda Jackson, and Edwina Currie, are usually more biddable that their male counterparts, but it’s hard not to suspect that Mr Law’s problem was best summed up by his former colleagues. Western Mail Outrage at bid for early by-election:
Last night former Welsh Secretary Ron Davies, who counted Mr Law as a personal friend, said Mr Law stood ‘head and shoulders’ above his Assembly colleagues.
BBC Political tributes to Peter Law:
Paul Flynn, MP for Newport East, said: “He will be remembered as a man who stood up for his beliefs.
“I have sweet memories and respect for a very courageous man.”
He said: “He had a talent as a politician and was one of the best speakers in the assembly in my mind, but he didn’t have enough time to make an impression in Westminster.”
Translation: an awkward bugger, not a drone.
Western Mail:
The Labour Party appeared to have committed another major own goal last night with government whips said to be pressing for an early by-election within hours of the death of Independent Blaenau Gwent MP and AM Peter Law.
Mr Law died early yesterday morning from a brain tumour which he was diagnosed with weeks before his famous triumph in last year’s General Election.
As tributes from all sides poured in for one of Wales’ most popular politicians, it emerged that Labour whips at Westminster were pressing for a by-election to take place as early as May 25.
For that to happen, a writ would have to be moved in the House of Commons as early as next week.
That would be before Mr Law’s funeral, which will be held in Christ Church, Ebbw Vale on Thursday May 4 — a year to the day since his election to Parliament.
Michael White in tehgrauniad: Rebel’s death means trouble in the valleys is well-informed and fair.
Mr [Rhodri] Morgan, who is seeking a third term as Wales’s first minister next year, joined lavish tributes from all parties to the dead MP and assembly member. Mr Law was likable and approachable, as well as being the kind of popular leftwing troublemaker who has been a thorn in Blairism’s side on both sides of the river Severn. “A champion of the people,” one ally called him.
It was only prudent to praise him. Welsh opponents agree that there is no popular revolt against Mr Morgan, a Brownite who has taken the precaution of urging the prime minister to step down next spring to boost his own third-term hopes.
Rhodri, as everyone calls him, remains personally popular. When the Welsh oak desks in the admired new assembly building on Cardiff Bay split before the official opening, Mr Morgan attributed the defect to Welsh oak’s “strange characteristics. The oak doesn’t want to be a desk, it wants to be a tree.”
Who would want to be a tree?
But he is 66 and has promised to retire at 70 in 2009. He has no clear successor. So the shine is off the Morgan regime.
The shine is long-gone from Rhodri. Nice enough guy, but not the pin bright networker of the 90s.
At 5% Welsh unemployment is edging up faster than England’s, and in a “bonfire of the quangos” he annoyed the Welsh business and cultural elite by abolishing the Welsh Development Agency this year and emasculating the Welsh Arts Council. Powers were taken in-house by Mr Morgan - a bunker mentality move, say his critics.
The “bunker mentality” criticism is probably right, but so was the decision.
These 138 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:11pm GMT Permanent link.
How He Does It »
I wondered what to say about the John Prescott story when I heard it. “No chance of free eye tests coming back under Labour then?” was the leading candidate. Then I saw the Mirror cover on Guido. It’s pictures like that that make you understand why Labour took to spin doctors in the first place. I doubt the Mirror exclusive will stay up long, but dear god:
Mr Prescott was also spotted springing out in front of her while pulling a funny face to make her laugh.
Surely he was born like that?
His other staff began noticing he was making trips into his department — seemingly just to chat with Tracey, who lives with 46-year-old lorry driver Barrie Williams.
Well, why else would he visit his department? There’s a quite nasty, and probably libellous, insinuation there which I won’t trouble to spell out.
There is some mixed praise for Prescott in the article: he comes over a generous, caring, affectionate, and loyal (if not monogamous), but despite that, he’d done up like a kipper.
You may want to put down any drink you’re holding or finish chewing before reading on.
Mr Prescott — nicknamed Two Jags for his love of large cars — pored over Tracey’s holiday photographs, stumbling over his words as he lavished praise on her good looks.
I can’t believe it either. It must be love.
These 154 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:17pm GMT Permanent link.
Thursday, 27 April 2006
Correspondents And Commentators »
O vox populi, vox dei. I had a lucky escape yesterday: I was tempted to cite Stephen Pollard as a political authority. I can laugh about it now, but at the time he seemed almost credible. Who follows Clarke?
The story I am being told is that, even as the PM prepared to back his Home Secretary at PMQs this morning, the feeling in Number 10 was that today will be Charles Clarke’s last day in office and that a reshuffle was already being pepared for.
Alan Johnson will be Home Secretary.
Even if you knew that Clarke had offered his resignation, this still seemed plausible. Clarke is doomed, but clearly Number 10 takes the view that he’ll go when the PM decides, not on the whim of the Opposition.
Today we have Wrong on both counts. If you hope that this is a speedy retraction, you hope in vain.
Pollard is wrong at greater length in the Times: It’s not a sniggering matter (The Times).
What turns it, however, from a private to a public matter is that the affair was conducted, according to the reports, almost entirely in Mr Prescott’s Admiralty House flat — a flat paid for and maintained by the taxpayer. We have, in other words, handed over our taxes to facilitate Mr Prescott’s sex life. That does not strike me as the most efficient use of taxpayers’ money.
I think it’s a bigger scandal than coverage so far suggests, but for the reason that Nigel Clark gives in a letter to the Torygraph.
Sir — Any inappropriate relationship between a boss and their subordinate is a matter of concern for an employer and cannot be considered a private matter. Mr Prescott has made a serious error of judgment and Downing Street’s refusal to act shows a failure in its duty of care towards civil servants.
I don’t care who Prescott shags (well, provided he doesn’t abuse his office, say to get a visa for her nanny). The proper thing would have been to sever either the affair or the work relationship, and to see that Ms Temple was transferred so that his feelings for her had no bearing on their work.
Three rather brilliant letters:
Sir — Now we know why Mr Prescott kept falling asleep in the Commons.
Brian Christley, Abergele, Conwy
Sir — Another illusion shattered. I thought John Prescott was in a permanent relationship with meat pies.
Keith Flett, London N17
Sir — If ever proof were needed that power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.
Mark Calvin, Tunbridge Wells, Kent
And one which could be in the Prescott section, but was (properly) with the Charles Clarke mailbag.
Sir — Has anyone spotted the bad news hidden by yesterday’s disclosures?
Brian Farmer, Blackwood, Monmouthshire
Since I’m quoting DT letters, here’s one of the best. Well-written, concise, coherent, it’s hard to credit that it comes from a politician. I don’t like negative campaigning, and I’ve reservations about the whole “don’t vote BNP” thing — parties should give positive reasons to vote, but this may be an exception.
Sir — Some of your correspondents seem not to understand what I wrote about the BNP’s Left-wing manifesto. They ignore the attachment to nationalisation and the central direction of the economy, and fasten on to the restoration of sovereignty by leaving the EU, halting immigration, corporal and capital punishment and prison sentences to be served in full. Just what in particular is Right-wing about such policies?
Jim Callaghan (in contrast to Macmillan and Heath) did act to control immigration. Many in the Labour Party want to get out of the EU. My party leader wants to stay in. The Soviet Union had an essentially selective education system, corporal and capital punishment and a policy of keeping its opponents — let alone criminals — behind bars.
Dave Prentis of Unison (Letters, April 26) claims that the BNP’s racist views are “Right-wing.” If so, Stalin was a Right-winger. Parties of the Left or Right may be racist. The BNP is a racist Left-wing party.
I think there’s a case for calling Stalin a “right-winger” and a case for arguing that just because “X” is Labour policy does not mean that “X” is left-wing. And I do believe that as “right-wing” and “left-wing” are commonly used, the BNP is a right-wing party. Still, Lord Tebbit (for it is he), may have cost them a few votes, which is not, IMO, a bad thing at all.
These 337 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:43am GMT Permanent link.
Saturday, 29 April 2006
We Interupt This Blog »
Torygraph breaking news: Keith Richards hurt after falling from tree. Don’t say this blog doesn’t keep up with the big stories. There’s a picture with the splendid caption, “Richards previously fell off a ladder.” And some people think the news is full of trivia.
These 44 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 7:18pm GMT Permanent link.
The Nine Billion Names Of Dr Who »
I can resist anything except temptation.
Oscar Wilde
But first, some poetry.
It is right it should be so,
Man was made for joy and woe.
Wm Blake.
We look before and after,
And pine for what is not
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught.
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.
Shelley.
Last week, I meant to blog about the numerous classic (you can add scare quotes if you wish) science fiction references in Doctor Who. I’ve largely forgotten what they were now, but there were a few crackers in this week’s episode. I don’t know if Faust and The Bible really count as SF but, by god, they were in this week’s.
The conquering races adopting phylogenetic aspects of the conquered thing, is that Iain M Banks or Star Trek?
I like the way this series is giving Billie Piper a chance to act. In the first episode, she got to Rose as Zoe Wannamaker would have played her. Now she got to be a suddenly jealous wife. Anthony Head (if you’re British, he’s the guy in the coffee ad in the 80s; if you’re too young for that or American, he’s Giles in Buffy) showed why people go to drama school when he did his headmaster-who-is-really-a-bat-deafened-by-a-fire-alarm-act. Makes being-a-tree seem worthwhile.
But to come back to the Bible/Faust bit. Anthony Head can be a fantastic actor, and his career burial in coffee ads, Buffy, and the stage version of The Rocky Horror Show is some sort of testament to the unfairness of life. His temptation of the Doctor may be one of the highlights of the current series. Of course it was unsubtly flagged, and wise children were incited to shout “Don’t listen to him” to the television, but that’s melodrama. No one mistakes Doctor Who for Ken Loach. The point is, he presented what I recognise as complete evil. I don’t use the word normally, though some decents used to be very fond of it. The love of power, like the love of money, is the root of all evil, as the good book says. Our Doctor (oor Doctor, your Doctor, a’body’s Doctor) was offered temptation: to turn back the clock (and the Time War), to rule with benevolence and wisdom. In short, he was offered power and “if-only.” Others have traded on “if-only”. Hitler believed, or at least ranted as if he believed, that “if-only” there were no Jews, then …
To turn this to a political post, our Decent friends offer similar hopes. If we had power rather than them, we wouldn’t make their blinkered, glib mistakes. We’d be kind and benevolent. This is how Satan tempted Jesus.
I suspect fans will demur, but this may have been a great episode. A real moral core: people die, relationships end, relationships can be very complex, and above all, don’t accept absolute power.
These 430 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 9:38pm GMT Permanent link.