Quiz

Guess the programme being described (without googling):

The show crossed the Atlantic 18 months after its US launch, but the BBC rejected it because of its "authoritarian aims"

Psychiatrists- As Dangerous As Plumbers.

This New York Times report on the massacre at Fort Hood- "Army Doctor Held in Fort Hood Rampage"- is more notable for the words it doesn't use than those it does. In that sense it resembles the BBC's classic- " Plumber appears on terror charges".

Do they think that readers won't put 2 and 2 together when they see the suspect's name? Not that they should have headlines blaring out "Muslim Nutter Goes On Rampage", but it is clearly worth mentioning that the chief suspect is a Muslim given that the US is fighting islamist organisations that purport to represent Muslims. It could be that religion isn't the shooter's motive but it is legitimate line of enquiry. If reports in other more open newspapers are accurate, then it is highly likely that the massacre was related to the shooter's beliefs.

Mouse In Trap.

Bea Does Belfast

Beatrix Campbell OBE, diverts her attention away from uncovering ritual abuse to look at Northern Ireland.

The coverage of the Independent Monitoring Commission's (IMC's) 22nd report on paramilitary activities, vindicates that tradition. Shootings by dissident republican sects at war with both the British and Sinn Féin defined the news. A month ago when US secretary of state Hillary Clinton visited Northern Ireland it was the same story: new threat from republicans. So, is peace in Northern Ireland still threatened by the republicans?

No, says the IMC.

As useless as the IMC are it does seem unlikely that in a year which has seen three murders and several foiled car bombings they would say that there was no threat from republicans. Sure enough on pages 11-14 of the IMC report that she links to it goes into detail about a great number of attacks by the Real IRA. This has been pointed out in the comments of the article by someone.

She continues:

In fact, the Provisional IRA has disarmed and disbanded.

First of all the PIRA has not disbanded, the IMC believes they have disarmed though. Secondly she was talking about "dissident republicans", which are those not in Sinn Fein or the PIRA.

She then indulges in a bit of unsourced allegations:

The sovereign government finally established at Stormont was wrecked not by republicans but Peter Mandelson's undiplomatic and undignified endorsement of a unionist agenda and by MI5's messing about with spooks at Stormont.

Peter Mandelson, whom in most respects I can't stand, was probably the best Northern Ireland secretary since Roy Mason. So who is Campbell referring to when she talks about "the sovereign government" and where is their evidence of this great plot? She doesn't even provide a link that flatly contradicts her claim as she did earlier, evidence is not needed.

Jumping forward a bit Bea adds:

These figures indicate some very worrying trends: loyalist gangsterism is rife, dangerous and productive, and dissident sects have murdered members of the security forces

This is evidence that she is mendacious rather than simply stupid. Reading the sentence is clearly supposed to give the impression that the "dissident sects" who have murdered members of the security forces were loyalist gangsters rather than the republican gangsters who she is trying to airbrush out of the picture.

Is there anyone else who is so consistently wrong about so many issues as Beatrix Campbell?

Who Pays The Piper

Curious isn't it, David Milband has adopted a highly critical approach to Russia during his tenure as Foreign Secretary (rightly so in my opinion) and yet soon after his name starts being touted for the role of EU foreign minister he does a 180 degree u-turn, decides that murder by nuclear terrorism on the streets of London is no biggie and that the Merkel-Sarkozy appeasement approach is much better.

I Hate Young People

Not people who happen to be young, but the phrase "young people". Is there anything more irritating than constantly referring to young people as "young people" when done by politicians or other professional busybodies? The phrase grates like nails being dragged down a blackboard. This is the immediate article that prompted this post:

Many of the 300 young people attending the debate, including the young person I accompanied, left home at 5.30am during their half-term holiday to represent the views and opinions of their peers, and they did so with passion and integrity. Young people rely on public transport, and it was this that let them down and resulted in the late start to the debate.
.....
Young people have never been allowed to sit on the formidable green benches before, and I imagine that some were daunted by the prospect.
......
I have worked with children and young people for many years, and do not consider them to be a helpless group who will eventually grow into citizens.
......
I saw young people of all shapes and sizes; some were shy and others were confident. None were brazen.These young people are not merely "playing" at politics – they are elected by young people to raise awareness of the issues that matter to them.
.......
It showed that, when given the opportunity, young people are able to forcefully debate, discuss and fully participate in local and national decision-making.

I fear that your article disrespected the many young people of this country who are trying to make a difference and contribute positively.

This is about the "youth parliament", a body made up of the sort of young people who refer to themselves as "young people".

Musical Interlude

Mentioning US TV a couple of posts ago reminded me of a song that appeared once in the soundtrack of what is my personal favourite show. Anyway as I've never heard the track anywhere else or heard of the band in any other context I'm guessing that few of my readers have either so I thought I'd put it up here. It is called Cuentan Que El and it's by 'Whitehouse':

No Vote On Lisbon

As widely expected David Cameron has announced that there won't be a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty now that it is in force. I always thought this was obvious because it would weaken him greatly if he lost and even if he won it would over shadow his government for at least a couple of years as he tries to negotiate a fresh arrangement.

I still think he should find some EU related topic to have a referendum on in order to satisfy the eurosceptic wing of the party* and the public.

* Within the Tory party probably everyone under the age of 55 is some kind of eurosceptic at least relative to 15 years ago, even if there is a divide between those who want to leave and those who simply want to pull back a bit. There is no longer a substantial body of opinion in favour of ever deeper union.

Conspiracies New & Old

After the Polish Chief Rabbi torpedoed Labour's smear campaign against the Tories' European ally last week the journalists who had been going along with Labour's spin had some explaining to do. For instance Toby Helm:

What I understand is that Schudrich has been under the most enormous pressure from the highest authorities in Poland to retract the remarks, but has refused to do so. The pressure, I am told, came from Kamiński's Law and Justice party, the party of the Polish president.

So could we be seeing the an old conspiracy being inverted to create a new one?

• Old Conspiracy- International Jewry is conspiring behind the scenes to control the political leaders of sovereign nations.
  

• New Conspiracy- Domestic political parties are conspiring behind the scenes to control international Jewry.

Victory!

The mouse has been caught, I put down the trap without any bait in the hope that the mouse would get used to it (as suggested by Richard in the comments) but it ended up going right into the trap on the first day without any bait at all. I feel bad for the mouse, he should at least have had something to eat before he got evicted.

After taking a picture of him (which I'll put up later) I released the rodent into a lay by a couple of miles from the house.

First They Came For The Idiots....

.... and I did not speak out because I was not an idiot.

Media Concentration Is Bad

In Prospect magazine Peter Jukes compares British and American television drama, something which I have done frequently here. Jukes knows a lot more about the behind the screen workings of television drama so he isn't simply comparing the output but also what goes into making TV drama.

The difference between 1994 and 2008 is startling. Instead of being the responsibility of four network controllers, most drama is now commissioned by one person.

That person is Ben Stephenson, BBC controller of drama commissioning. He has faced mounting criticism since last year, when he made ill-advised remarks about a “limited pool of talent” for television drama

..........

But everyone missed the glaring issue: why are these questions being addressed to only one person? In 1994, I worried about the cultural power of four network controllers. Now you can forget Channel 4 and BBC2: they can make decent one-offs, such as Red Riding and Freefall this year, but both have basically dropped out of adult dramas. ITV has fared no better. In the 1990s the powerful baronies of Granada, Yorkshire TV, LWT and Thames had some autonomy. But their amalgamation into one corporation, followed by a catastrophic fall in advertising revenue, has turned ITV drama into a shadow of its former self. Whatever your view of public service broadcasting (and I support it) the near-monopoly of the BBC in drama commissioning is disastrous.

So maybe a start to rebuilding the quality of British television (assuming that abolishing the license fee isn't going to happen in the near future) would be to make the BBC split the drama commissioning between their different channels and try to find some means of enticing the other channels to get back in the game.

Incidentally is the decline in ITV's advertisng revenues wholly unrelated to the manner in which they have rushed downmarket at breakneck speed, I realise that a multi-channel environment makes their job harder but that isn't the whole explanation is it?

Meet The New Boss.

According to Political Betting the Tory lead with ICM is bigger than Labour's at this stage prior to the 1997 election. Hooray we will soon be able to kick out the authoritarian, nepotistic Labour government with an ,authoritarian nepotistic Conservative government.

It's moments like this that make me just happy to be alive at this hour.

Mouse Update.

Okay I got one of these mousetraps and so the battle of wits between human and rodent begins. At the moment it's 1-0 to the mouse.

I added the bait (some Chocolate Buttons) and placed the trap behind the settee that I'd seen the mouse emerge from before. Unfortunately my dog likes choclate too and rather impressively he managed to squeeze in behind the settee pull out the trap and open it.

So I am now out of bait and in need of a dog free place to set the trap.

Dubious Associates Uncovered.

The intervention of the Chief Rabbi of Poland into the Michael Kaminsky on the Today programme appeared to have scuppered the Miliband/ Guardian/ New Statesman smear campaign.

However it now emerges that there is incontrovertable proof that Kaminsky has been associating with deeply unsavoury figures.

Quote Of The Day

The footballer Marlon King was recently jailed for attacking a woman, given that he has a track record of committing very similar attacks I wouldn't have thought that there was much debate over his guilt. However:

As the sentence was delivered , several of King's supporters stormed from court, swearing at the judge.

One screamed: 'This is a clear case of institutional racism.

'You should not be up there... Up the National Front. Heil Hitler.'

Drug Czar Czacked.

Not only is lying not a sackable offence with this government, telling the truth is.

I support legalisng most drugs, including cannabis, but I do accept that sometimes those in favour can be too complacent about the negative consequences. There are strong arguments against legalising or decriminalising drugs, see James Q Wilson's article here for instance:

The central problem with legalizing drugs is that it will increase drug consumption under almost any reasonable guess as to what the legalization (or more modestly, the decriminalization) regime would look like. The debate, I think, must be between those who admit this increase and then explain why they would find it tolerable and those who admit the increase and find it intolerable.
.......
Now what happens? Here is where the only meaningful debate can exist. Do you think that there will be a decrease in drug crime? Maybe—if the crime committed by users seeking money to buy drugs and the dealers protecting their right to sell drugs falls by an amount greater than the increase in crime committed by addicted users who are no longer capable of holding a job. Not all coke or heroin addicts are incapacitated, but a significant fraction—perhaps one-fifth, perhaps more—are.

However any argument either for or against has to be rooted in the facts not in spin and propaganda. Ignoring reality is not a basis for making good policy.

This also applies to other controversial subjects. This week it emerged that the government had suppressed discussion of the relationship between crime and immigration when being honest about it would have avoided the dual dangers of complacency and hysteria.

The fact that fear mongers like Liam Donaldson remain in post and David Nutt is sacked speaks volumes.

One Face Per Person.

Kelly Brook reveals: Two-faced Ant and Dec wrecked my TV career

I don't claim to be fully up to date with light entertainment figures but I'm fairly sure that "Ant and Dec" are two separate individuals and therefore the number of faces that they would be expected to have is in fact two. One each.