Friday, 3 June 2005
Catching Up »
The first couple of days, I thought I’d go crazy, but after a week of not blogging, I don’t miss it all that much.
Well, the Frogs and the Clogs said “Non,” and “Nein,” respectively, which is good. If the choice is “take it or leave it,” the only proper reply is “Go fuck yourself.” What’s wrong with a short, clear constitution, which a not insignificant percentage of the population might actually read? which might be taught in secondary schools? And even politicians might understand? If lawyers and political researchers have years of training in obscurantism, give the job to a philosopher like A.C. Grayling, or a team of people (like the translators of the King James Bible) — I’d include Armando Iannucci, Richard Dawkins, and Harold Pinter, all of whom can render high-concepts (perhaps too high for the EU, of course) in parsable vernacular.
MPs, eh? What a shower. I was talking about writing to MPs in the pub last week, and here’s a couple of stories. One friend, AC, wrote to Jon Owen Jones (who used to work as a teacher with AC’s mum, when he was just plain “Jon Jones” — he didn’t get all Welsh until he ran for office, but then who calls their colleagues by their middle names?) after the Chinese Embassay in Kosovo was bombed, and got the reply “For evil to triumph, yada good men yada do nothing.” (I can’t remember the quote, and am too lazy to look it up; anyway, it assumes several things I’m sceptical of, namely “evil”, “trimuph,” “good men”, and “do nothing”, and courses of action which constitute something being in any way “good.") Whatever, it’s a strange justification for bombing the Chinese, even if they do use sweat shops to manufacture “Make Poverty History” wristbands.
The other story might be of some interest to Chris Brooke. DP was clearing out his late father’s effects and came across correspondence with William Hague’s office (when Hague was still Tory leader). He’d written a short half-page letter to the effect that Hague looked a prat in a baseball cap. (Which wasn’t very diplomatic, but he’s spend his career being diplomatic.) Clearly Hague’s people had looked him up, and written a one-and-a-half page reply which largely conceded that young William did indeed look a prat and would cease to wear said cap forthwith.
Typical really, write about something important, and they brush you off. Heap scorn on their headgear, and they spend the morning crafting a reply.
I doubt very much that this is true, but my barber told me that his nephew (all of three or four) was in nursery school and for some reason they were talking about animals, and the teacher asked what noise a frog makes. Well, it’s ding-ding-ding isn’t it? Of doubtful authenticity, but it’ll be everywhere by next week, if it’s not already.
These 479 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:45am GMT Permanent link.
Friday, 10 June 2005
Good And Bad Bloggage »
Sorta back. John B “boasts” that he researched and wrote a piece in under 25 minutes. Huh. Some people can cut out the research part altogether — see this clueless garbage (via Jackie D). The first sentence doesn’t make any sense:
One of the Number 1 traffic building secrets is adding content to your website.
How many number 1s are there at any one time? And anyway, the way to do it is — have content, add it to your site. No content, no writing, simple as that. (Though I’m sure I’ve violated that rule on occasion.)
Blogs are written in RSS or Atom …
No, they’re not.
After you set up your blog you need to change your settings to archive daily so you have a new page of content every time you make a post to your blog.
This is actually extremely annoying. The piece is only a few hundred words long. And it’s absolute tosh.
James Max is better, but seems to have stopped as soon as he started, something the Guardian seems to miss when it recommended him. Still, at least he got it for a while.
Kids however really get blogging. This is hilarious. Here’s the original.
These 148 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 2:19pm GMT Permanent link.
Wednesday, 15 June 2005
New World »
Another new planet: Scotsman: ‘Earth’s Bigger Cousin’ Found Circling Distant Star and BBC: Smallest extrasolar planet found.
Temperatures on the as yet unnamed planet could vary between 200 and 400 Celsius. The upper temperature limit of Sulfur-dependent bacteria on Earth is 115 C. So life is unlikely (plus the gravity is too much for humans to bear). This doesn’t mean there can’t be other planets further out, and rocky worlds round every star. And this is where I wish I recallled more physics. I’m not at all sure why there are so many planets close to their primary star when models suggest the planetary disc should be thrown further out, toward the orbit of Uranus. Are these false positives? The BBC:
“This planet answers an ancient question,” said team leader Geoffrey Marcy, professor of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley.
“Over 2,000 years ago, the Greek philosophers Aristotle and Epicurus argued about whether there were other Earth-like planets. Now, for the first time, we have evidence for a rocky planet around a normal star.”
It’s a merely a question for the Greeks, and a huge problem for monotheists. I’m sure Mad Mel will have a go at the whole of the biased media for doubting the Old Testament this way.
These 157 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:07am GMT Permanent link.
Thursday, 16 June 2005
The Future Is Here »
Scott Adams presents a fine three-frame digest of The Cluetrain Manifesto. (Some blogger — I forget who — said something about the Cluetrain Manifesto which implied an opinion higher than “unadulterated wank.” Jesus.)
These 33 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:52am GMT Permanent link.
Friday, 17 June 2005
Read The Rest Scale: 0 Out Of 5 »
Torygraph: ’Too injured to work’ man wrestled alligator. OK, maybe it’s 0.5.
(Apologies to Gary Farber.)
These 16 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:09am GMT Permanent link.
Margaret Hodge, Dipshit »
I’ve been a fan of Margaret Hodge for some time (Comedy Gold, Villains Of 2003, Sexual abuse does not exist in Islington, “the sheer arrogance to take the job of minister for children” after leading Islington council for 10 years while paedophiles abused children).
Now the Torygraph smells blood. Get a job at Tesco. The bloody woman can’t tell the lumpenproletariat from the skilled working class. Does she have any clue about Labour party history? It used to be about more than dinner parties and bum-sucking to millionaires.
Naturally, Ms Hodge is not pleased with the reaction — BBC:
But Mrs Hodge later hit back at her critics, saying: “I did not say that MG Rover workers should apply for jobs at Tesco.
“In my interview I said that whilst we all feel immense empathy for those who lost their jobs there are a range of new job opportunities coming to the West Midlands.
That interview was with the Wolverhampton Express and Star. I can’t find the interview itself, assuming that it merited an article to itself (typical NewLab MP: “Are you rich? No? well you can fuck off then"), so here’s the money quote from the paper in Jobless total rises after Rover collapse.
Mrs Hodge said 2,000 jobs were being created in a new development “a few miles from Rover” with 350 jobs at a new Tesco site which would “meet the needs of some of the unemployed”.
Sounds like, “Piss off, you’re lucky we don’t throw you all in the workhouse” to me.
These 166 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:43am GMT Permanent link.
The Great Exterminator »
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom
Proverbs 1:7
It’s not my philosophy.
The classic ‘bad wolf’ scenario …
Episode 2: The End of the World possibly referring to someone being a traitor and not what they seem.
The things you’ve seen … the bad wolf! the big bad wolf!
Episode 3: The Unquiet Dead, before Rose has seen very much at all.
Bad Wolf
Graffito on the Tardis, Episode 4: Aliens of London.
You would make a good Dalek.
Don’t worship me. I’d make a very bad god. You wouldn’t get a day off for starters.
My masters, they fear only one thing … the Doctor …
And in the final trail:
Hail the Doctor, the great exterminator.
This is going somewhere. So much for looking to it that one does not become a monster.
These 78 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:21pm GMT Permanent link.
How Many Millennium Things Can You Have In One City? »
On one of the (many) Doctor Who sites set up by the BBC:
I’m off to meet Rose in a bit — she said to look for You-Know-What in Cardiff Bay, which is right by the Millennium Something - that’s got to be the Millenniun Stadium. After all, how many Millennium Things can you have in one city?
Too many.
These 19 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:46pm GMT Permanent link.
Saturday, 18 June 2005
Protest Too Much? »
I think one of my fellow bloggers had it in for Tom Utley of the Torygraph but Google can’t find the relevant post. Mr Utley is a man amongst men: Why I’d join the nutty protester in Parliament Square.
Of course NuLab only want to ban bad protestors. Chairman Mao had the same problem: the false-consciousness middle-classes thinking they had rights. And the correspondence Nikolai Ceausescu and I had over the peasantry and proletariat the poor boy had to put up with! It would bring tears to your eyes. I wrote to the UN about the appalling treatment that well-meaning man received. Being the namby-pamby left-wingers they are, they never replied. The BBC seemed pleased. Yet another bias file opened.
See here, protesters! What if traitors like you had asked questions during WWII? I heard a certain Nye Bevan heckled dear Churchill, taking advantage of that great leader sometime after his first bottle of brandy. Well if he had, we’d be under the iron heel right now! Doubt, and the enemy wins!
Justin found US lied to Britain over use of napalm in Iraq war. I can’t see the problem here. They had to lie, any British Minister could have been an al-Qaeda spy. And they used napalm, so what? It was against the bad guys.
Backword says: “Kill ‘em all. God will know his own.”
These 227 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 2:03am GMT Permanent link.
What Is The Meaning Of This Negative? »
Never use a long word where a short one will do.
George Orwell, Politics and the English Language
I’m a bit disappointed. The first half of the last episode was great (and I don’t mean that in a grade-inflation kind of way, I mean like Euripides), but Rose’s return and the regeneration left me like a punctured bicycle on a hillside desolate. It was a bit too easy, and I’d hoped Chris Ecclestone’s leaving was a huge bluff. But the good stuff was huge (and I don’t mean that in a grade-inflation kind of way, I mean ‘huge’). The music, which I’ve had doubts about through the series came together for me at last. The kiss between Captain Jack and the Doctor may kill the series on US tv, at least on its ideal time slot, and if so, their controllers are fools.
Regular readers will know how lazy I am, so here’s Kurt Vonnegut on SF which I picked off the interwebthing, and now lives on my ‘Stickies’ (if you don’t know what Stickies are, you need a decent computer).
Eight rules for writing fiction:
- Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
- Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
- Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
- Every sentence must do one of two things — reveal character or advance the action.
- Start as close to the end as possible.
- Be a sadist. Now matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them — in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
- Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
- Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.
I give Russell T Davies’ Doctor Who 8 out of 8. It’s had other things too. I think I’ve mentioned the ‘panto’ element before: some hard core fans are annoyed because it’s not aimed at them: there are subtexts about politics ("Massive Weapons of Destruction") and lots of innuendo — this series has been aimed square at the family audience; something for everyone usually means a frazzled burger and a damp lettuce leaf, but here it’s been a success. The documentary before tonight’s episode demonstrated Ecclestone’s commitment to “Who” as a children’s show.
Someone said — in my off period — that the Cardiff episode had nothing for children, I disagree. The opening was funny, in a sick way, which would have appealed to me as a child. And the restaurant scene recalled “Abbot and Costello” routines — the wine switching especially, and I loved that when I was a kid.
Then there are the recurring themes. Not just “Bad Wolf” but echoes in the dialogue. When the Doctor was in the Big Brother House, Davina said “We’re coming to get you.” When Rose was held by the Daleks, the Doctor said, “I’m coming to get you.”
I didn’t take notes on Simon Pegg’s “slave” discussion with the Doctor, but Ecclestone made the word “Yes” have implications to worry Shakespeare, Wittgenstein, Chomsky, and Whorf. I did note the “No” dialogue:
The Dalek stratagem nears completion. The fleet is almost ready. You will not intervene.
Oh, really. Why is that then?
We have your assistant. You will obey or she will be exterminated.
No. [Everyone turns.]
Explain yourself.
I said, “No.”
What is the meaning of this negative?
It means “No.”
Sticking my neck out, I think that’s worthy of Pinter. When I was very very young and in need of some Spock, I thought “Negative” was a far better term than “No.” I grew up. Was this a dig at the obscrantism of small minds like the “croak voiced Dalek” John Birt? And never has the Dalek/Nazi connection been so explicit.
I don’t have the year or so it would take to list the good things about this series. And I don’t share the fans’ negatives (oops). I wasn’t keen on the first part of the gas mask story, but it all worked out in the end. And what an end. The kid was always a kid wearing a gas mask but I (and I think any viewer with any sensitivity) had come to think of the mask as being attached, so Ecclestone’s removal of said protection actually shocked me. It was only a bloody prop! Now that’s theatre. Likewise the person who said that he didn’t understand why one life being saved made crazy things come out of the sky — you’re missing the point. You think a wood can really walk — especially on an Elizabethan stage? Or someone’s jealousy can really be activated by a handkerchief? Or that a boy pretending to be a girl pretending to be a boy in order to prosecute her father fools anyone? Hell, it made me cry, That’s all I ask of drama. (Anyway, the world’s too complex for logic.)
Russell T. Davies, you’re a bastard because you’re a year younger than me, and because I couldn’t even get to submit scripts to the BBC. So with that out of the way, I hope you realise this “thank you” for raising the standard of drama is … well I mean it, let’s not be sickly.
These 697 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:59pm GMT Permanent link.
Sunday, 19 June 2005
And It Seems To Me You Lived Your Life »
Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
T.S Eliot
Tomorrow’s Torygraph: Straw attacks EU leaders. Stand up for the common … man Jack. Oh, you are standing up. Sit down then.
“Europe is divided,” he said. “It is essentially a division between whether you want a European Union that is able to cope with the future or whether you want a European Union that is trapped in the past.
“That is the fundamental change before us. And it is not one Europe can dodge.”
There’s a law of haggling I learned in Marrakech, “walk away.” If you don’t like Europe, leave. It’s not a conflict between those who know and those who don’t. Don’t try to bully people. If you’re so confident, do a Steve Jobs (maybe I need a better example). What does “trapped in the past” even mean?
Updated for sanity and clarity.
These 159 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:10am GMT Permanent link.
Monday, 20 June 2005
Farewell, Croak-Voiced Dalek »
Everyone, but everyone from Mad Mel (via Mike Power) to ’Nicely’ Nick Cohen (via Jamie) seems upset about Tony Blair’s reliance on the generously unqualified and hugely expensive David Bennett and fellow scam artists. (I once wrote a post on the ideal [Stephen] Pollardian school.)
One of those cutpurses is John Birt, whose promotion of quality at the BBC made Gordon Gecko look like Walter Pater. Management consultants, what would the Beeb do without them?
“At the outset, we were told by many people within the business that we were making an impossible programme,” said Davies. “Demographic experts told us that a show designed for family viewing was unrealistic in the current TV climate.
Russell T Davies. Should have listened to the experts, Russell. You can never have enough Celebrity Love Changing Rooms. The writers, actors, producers, composers, etc only leech money from accountants.
(At least one former D-G changed his mind.)
These 113 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:19pm GMT Permanent link.
Tuesday, 21 June 2005
Adherence To The Repeated Meme »
The reliably splendid Edward_ beats me to the latest liberal blogosphere zinger, The (Not So) Thin Line Between Love and Hate. Read. He’s too good to excerpt.
He pointed to a scar above his right eye cutting a crooked path through his bushy eyebrow. “I was at a soccer game in Ghazi Stadium in 1998. Kabul against Mazar-i-Sharif, and by the way the players weren’t allowed to wear shorts. Indecent exposure, I guess.” He gave a tired laugh, “Anyway, Kabul scored a goal and the man next to me cheered loudly, Suddenly this young bearded fellow who was patrolling the aisles, eighteen years old by the look of him, he walked up to me and struck me on the forehead with the butt of his Kalashnikov. ‘Do that again and I’ll cut out your tongue you old donkey!’ he said.” Rahim Khan rubbed the scar with a gnarled finger. “I was old enough to be his grandfather and I was sitting there, blood gushing down my face, apologizing to that son of a dog.”
Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner, p 173.
Sean of Preposterous Universe is a member of a Persecuted minority. The comments are splendid too, espeicially charlie wagner
Do we not reme[m]ber what happened to Bertrand Russell in 1940 at CCNY? His appointment to teach was revoked after a firestorm of protest over his atheism and “immorality”. Even Einstein himself came to testify on Russell’s behalf, generating his famous remark: “Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds”.
I’ve given up hoping that anything will ever change in this world.
And Gary Cornell two comments down:
His argument is actually reminiscent of Kant’s argument that true moral behaviors does not consist of following rules for fear of consequences but decisions made freely.
But I guess Kant couldn’t get a job as chair of Brooklyn’s Philosophy Department in the current climate[.]
You didn’t think Kant was an atheist? May you burn in hell, bookish pedant.
To come back to Edward_ and Love in Action’s mission statement:
We believe that the Bible is the infallible Word of God. It is perfect truth from cover to cover, and it all points to Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. We believe in one God, eternally existent in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
We believe that for the salvation of lost and sinful man, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and regeneration by the Holy Spirit are essential. We believe in the present ministry of the Holy Spirit, by Whose indwelling the Christian is enabled to live a godly life. We believe in the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life eternal.
We believe the scripture is the final truth and authority concerning all matters of morality, as well as the hope and healing for morality in dilemma. We acknowledge the sinfulness of any sexual act outside of the scriptural context of Holy Matrimony between a man and a woman. We uphold Christ’s offer of redemption and freedom to all who come to Him.
As John Cole points out, these folks don’t support the Taliban, no not at all.
The sensible Ben is somewhat unimpressed by bearded loon Frank Dobson.
Do you believe that anyone should be allowed to incite hatred against other people on the grounds of their religious belief? I don’t, even though I have no religious belief myself. That’s because I believe that nobody should suffer assaults, or live in fear, because of their religious beliefs.
Well, that’s a good point Frank — the “I believe that nobody should suffer assaults” — at least, I agree with it. But what is special about religious belief? Will there be a law to protect Man U supporters next, despite the quite understandable hatred they engender? And what about Jim Davidson? I suppose he should be protected from assault, but it’s a little hard to articulate why. I thought the law prohibited assault as it was. I didn’t realise you could plead, “I hit him 40 times with an axe, M’Lud, but you see, he was a soap-dodger.”
(What, BTW, is inciting religious hatred? I don’t have any special animus against Islam, and the passage quoted earlier was an attack on the Taliban, but I accept it is out of context. If I hadn’t been in a wittering-on mood, could I be done for that?)
I believe in equality before the law and that is why I strongly support the government’s new bill to outlaw incitement to hatred of people on the grounds of their religion.
Again, Frank, why religion? Why not football teams, politics, hair colour, or taste in humour? Can I threaten Tories? UKIP supporters then? Suppose some crazy preacher (OK that guy who doesn’t like Jerry Springer: the Opera then) denounces gays (which I think is a: his right, and b: deeply foolish) and I join a march denouncing him. If he says he feels threatened, can I be done?
Let us look at some of the objections put forward by the bill’s opponents. They say it extends the blasphemy law. It doesn’t. If it did, I wouldn’t dream of supporting it because I have been campaigning for years to abolish the blasphemy law.
Let us look at some arguments by atheists. They say God doesn’t exist. He does. If he didn’t, I wouldn’t dream of believing in him, because I used to a cocaine-taking alcoholic spoiled rich kid who skipped military service. (Who am I? Another intellectual challenge from Backword.)
As long ago as 1949, Lord Denning described it as a “dead letter”, and in 1967 parliament repealed the Blasphemy Act of 1697. That left the common law offence which, on the strength of a judgment at York summer assizes in 1838, protects only the Church of England; and the law commission recommended 20 years ago that the common law offence should be abolished. And so it should.
You haven’t answered the question, Frank.
Changes in the law bring about changes in behaviour, partly by acting as a deterrent and partly by declaring that something is wrong.
Despite being a reluctant “political” blogger, I confess to ignorance of the seating arrangements in the Mother of Parliaments. So the best I can say to you Frank is, next time you sit on the green benches, look around for a red-faced ancient cove. He’s called Ian Paisley. I know a little about the reach of British Law. And I’ve heard what the IRA do to their enemies. Now, I’m also aware of the argument that he’s Sinn Fein’s greatest recruiting sergeant, but he doesn’t share that view. Now, what was the deterrent argument again? It’s also a little late to change his mind about what is right and wrong.
This is why I shouldn’t stop blogging, even if it brings out the beast in me. I blogged on Intolerance And Judging Others last year. And it included Home Office’s Incitement to Religious Hatred FAQ:
We do not expect a large number of prosecutions, just as there have not been a large number of prosecutions under incitement to racial hatred. In the past 3 years 84 cases have been referred to the CPS, of which 4 proceeded to prosecution, of which 2 resulted in convictions. However, the offence has provided a powerful response and a strong deterrent to the conduct of racist and other extremist organisations and individuals.
As I said then (and I’m too lazy/incompetent to improve upon it):
I’m happy to believe that the police got this right — there really were 84 cases of “incitement to racial hatred.” The CPS disagreed, rejecting 80 of those, and the courts only convicted two.
On the “strong deterrent to the conduct of racist and other extremist organisations and individuals” tell that to the Pakistanis terrorised in Bradford. I don’t dispute that idiot football fans have stopped throwing bananas at black players, only that they did so because of a law they’re unlikely to have read. Personally, I think there is a very simple explanation why racist morons became uncool. Right-wing readers may have to swallow here. He’s French. And the highly paid government lawyers have been in his wake like seagulls following a trawler ever since.
Now, I haven’t even mentioned that racist series on the Biased BBC. Since when have religious fanatics slaughtered the unarmed, or thought they made paradise?
In the last census, I was a Jedi Knight. If there is a next one (a little more likely since Bush appointee John Bolton moved on), my god is the Dalek Emperor. Hey, can I exterminate* Frank Dobson and claim impunity?
* For any children reading, “exterminate” is just a fancy word meaning “kill.” If a stranger comes up to you using words you don’t know which he or she seems to think are impressive, I advise you to kick them very hard where it hurts and run for your life. They are almost certainly management consultants.
These 746 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:34am GMT Permanent link.
In My Master's Hour Of Triumph »
If I had my life to live over,
I’d try to make more mistakes next time.
I would relax.
I would be sillier than I have been this trip.
I know of very few things I would take seriously. I would take more chances.
I would take more trips.
I would climb more mountains, swim more rivers and watch more sunsets.
I would eat more ice cream and less beans.
I would have more actual troubles and fewer imaginary ones.
You see, I am one of those people who live prophylactically and sanely and sensibly,
Hour after hour, day after day.
Oh, I have had my moments and, if I had to do it over again, I’d have more of them.
In fact, I’d try to have nothing else. Just moments, one after another.
If I had my life to live over,
I would start bare-footed earlier in the spring and stay that way later in the fall.
I would play hooky more.
would ride on more merry-go-rounds
I’d pick more daisies.
Harley-Davidson advert, late 90s
Zonker Harris rises like a lion from the slumber. “Oh, like you’ve never done that?” Indeed.
These 17 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:53am GMT Permanent link.
The Snoops And The Dog-ends »
“It was my little daughter,” said Parsons with a sort of doleful pride. “She listened at the keyhole. Heard what I was saying, and nipped off to the patrols the very next day. Pretty smart for a nipper of seven, eh? I don’t bear her any grudge for it. In fact I’m proud of her. It shows I brought her up in the right spirit, anyway.”
Nineteen Eighty-Four
Torygraph: Cigarette snoopers to enforce ban:
New powers effectively criminalising smoking in public were announced by the Government yesterday, with the minister in charge promising an “intelligence-led approach to enforcing the law”.
Informers will be encouraged to report breaches of sweeping bans on the habit, in which company smoking rooms will be outlawed and places such as bus shelters and the outsides of office blocks made no-smoking areas.
…
Caroline Flint, the public health minister, confirmed that the policy would be vigorously enforced with the assistance of informers from the public.
“I don’t think we are talking about brigades of people out on the streets,” she said. “What we are talking about is an intelligence-led approach to enforcing the law.”
If thy boss refuse thy pay rise, shop him to the Safety Nazis.
I see nothing wrong with individuals banning smoking from their premises. I would never choose to work next to a smoker. But this still seems one the things the market is ideal for.
The government is at least progressive in one direction I thought it had turned its back on.
Herbal cigarettes will not be covered by the ban.
So when the inspectors call, just say, “I invented it in Camberwell, and it looks like a carrot.”
These 88 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:36pm GMT Permanent link.
More Management Consultant Fun »
BBC: DTI name changes cost ‘£30,000’.
The cost of the week-long rebrand of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to Productivity, Energy and Industry (DPEI) cost nearly £30,000.
The bill to the tax payer for the rebranding exercise has been criticised by the Tories who say the cash could have provided six hip replacements.
Hip replacements? Isn’t Paul Smith wearing Tone hip enough? Oh, that kind of hip. It’s five years to the next election, so the stupid old buggers will either have forgotten how beneficent New Labour were or have dropped dead.
Changing the name for a week (and not noticing that ‘DPEI had prompted “various descriptions… penis and dippy"’) cost 30 Grand. Which, you have to admit, is fucking funny.
Actually, before I post, it’s not. DL’s friend Steve who is more of an acquaintance to me has had one leg shorter than the other his whole life. Now in his late 40s, he needs a hip replacement. Waiting time on the NHS: unknown but close to a year. Waiting time after going private (persuaded by NHS): one week. He can afford to pay. That’s six people who can’t New Labour screwed by poncing around over a name. Bunch of cunts, they are.
These 157 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 6:13pm GMT Permanent link.
A Travesty Of Justice »
Perhaps I’m thick. This has occurred to me many, many times. But first a headline which, when I read it in RSS, made me punch the air. Telegraph: Former Klan leader found guilty. There are two words missing. Here they are: “of manslaughter.” The Telegraph is still my favourite newspaper for news reporting — here’s the crime with not a word wasted.
The three civil rights activists were held at a police station on trumped-up speeding charges, then released late at night and ambushed by members of the Klan and police.
Their bodies, beaten and riddled with bullets, were dumped under an earthen dam and only found 44 days later, following an intense search.
Premeditated? check. Are there grounds of self-defence or temporary insanity? Uncheck. Let’s hope that now the bastard is 80 (and as he’s from Mississipi, his parents were probably closely related), his IQ is less than his age. Oh, damn, he’s not black. So no chance of the painful death the evil little Nazi deserves.
These 116 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:38pm GMT Permanent link.
Criminals Are Thick »
I haven’t linked to the splendid The Law West of Ealing Broadway for a while, so here’s a post to rectify that omission. ‘Bystander’ post on ASBOs Yet Again.
The defendant appealed against an absolute discharge, which is pretty unusual, but the appeal was on a principle of law. As I read it, and I am not a lawyer, the defendant had been made subject to an ASBO that forbade him from committing any criminal offence — which would be illegal in any event. That, in the view of the wise Lord Justice Brooke, was too wide, and Mr. Justice Field agreed. The prohibitions ordered had to be “sufficiently specific and clear to enable the restricted party to comply without difficulty”.
Now, I know criminals tend to come from the lower deciles of the intelligence bell curve. And quite a few would not understand that if x is illegal, then you shouldn’t do x (where x is an intentional act of some sort, not the 22nd letter of the alphabet), to put it into philosophical terms. As I understand it, I am forbidden “from committing any criminal offence” as are you, assuming you are reading this in a state governed by some code of laws. Moreover, while previous convictions are not disclosed to juries, they are to the sentencing bench, who I’ve always understood punish recidivists more harshly. What exactly is the point of this ASBO?
I think the title of this post is wrong.
These 153 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:54pm GMT Permanent link.
Wednesday, 22 June 2005
Brandy And Cornflakes »
BBC: Pinochet ‘stable’ after fainting.
The former Chilean military ruler, General Augusto Pinochet, is recovering in hospital after fainting over breakfast, doctors say.
He hasn’t even been charged with human rights abuses this week, so either he overdid the brandy, or he’s just staying in practice. Chilean dissidents, if he pulls that when you walk in, just remember to ask the waiters for an ice bucket! You want him fully conscious. Fainting is for wussies. What do you call a former dictator who has shat himself? Fascist scum and inhuman mass-murdering pig, just as you would if he hadn’t.
These 82 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:34am GMT Permanent link.
Thursday, 23 June 2005
Porn Free »
I’m going to have to stop this political blogging lark. It does no good to my sanity. However … I realised that the Great Front Page London trip had been, kissed the hands of ancient money and influence, met a lord, and generally been introduced to a vision of this damp little island not seen since Josef Goebbels left the PR industry, and left again. Did these colossi of the hack world choose to write about their sojourn? They would write about their breakfast for the unforgiving deadline. They did not. Front Page disappoints me so.
But I need something to slag off, so here’s baby-faced Ben Shapiro being interviewed on FrontPage about his book, Porn Generation.
There were a few things that really pushed me to write “Porn Generation.” The first was the fact that I have three younger sisters, and I got sick and tired of having to drive them past pornographic Joe’s Jeans ads on Sunset Blvd – the billboards depict naked rear ends with only the Joe’s Jeans logo in the corner. My sisters can’t watch TV anymore because of all the raunchy broadcasting. They can’t watch most movies because of the oversexualization. They can’t listen to today’s popular music – even once-safe pop tarts like Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera now compete to see who can become the bigger cultural disgrace. They can’t surf the Internet, for fear that a pop-up porn ad might attack. But that’s not the big deal – the big deal is that my sisters live in a society where they can’t avoid having to see things they shouldn’t have to see. Because no matter how scrupulous they are, as long as their friends view this stuff, they have to hear about it. As long as Jenna Jameson can post billboards for her lesbian sex videos out in the open, they have to hear about it.
Straight away, I find the poor boy confused. Who is supposed to ban this stuff, the state? I haven’t been in LA for years, but I understand that Sunset Blvd is prime advertising space. Joe’s Jeans are clearly willing to pay to advertise there, and it must have some effect or they wouldn’t continue to do so (I’m not just assuming that the market is rational; I’m assuming that they couldn’t afford to advertise if it didn’t work), the billboard company take their money. This looks like US capitalism on all cylinders. Has Mr Shapiro ever visited an Amish homestead? Or read how poor Kabul was after the Taliban took control? Not to mention that the world is a little brighter for an attractive bottom. (An ungenerous thought about Mr Shapiro’s siblings occurs to me.) Oh, and they can’t surf the internet for fear of nasty pop-ups?
Well, you’d know all about that Ben.
I think that the “porn generation” — people 10-30, I’d say — has had more opportunity than any generation in world history. We’re the wealthiest; we’ve had the benefits of convenience; we’ve never truly had to face difficult foreign policy issues (until 9/11). We’ve had it pretty easy. And yet, for some reason, we’re largely aimless, apathetic, and narcissistic. I think a lot of that is due to lack of a moral system – in a world with no right and wrong, no good and evil, fighting for a cause is certainly a lot less romantic. While the 1960s flower-power generation was just as morally relativistic as today’s generation, they still believed in a misguided secular utopianism. When that idea caved away, new generations were left with no hope for a better world; they couldn’t fight for a non-existent ultimate truth, and man-made solutions were just as bad.
Speak for yourself. I’m of the same generation as William Hague, Stephen Pollard, and Michael Gove. It’s ridiculous to say we believe in the same things. To paraphrase Mrs Thatcher, “there are no such things as generations, only individuals …”
A female classmate from Harvard Law told me that the “Sex and the City” idea of femininity has now taken over among “porn generation” women.
Either his classmates have adopted his argot, or him memory is pretty free: and I suspect that Mr Shapiro hears what he wishes to hear.
The biggest problem with this phenomenon is that sex is not the same for women as it is for men; it is unquestionably more emotional for women than for men.
This wouldn’t explain why men seem to have written the great majority of love poetry in every canon, and why publishers (exclusively male until very recently) have found time for Sappho, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Christina Rossetti …
Men in general are quite willing to go along with the radical feminist interpretation of the female ideal — how many men are going to complain about promiscuous women who are aggressive about sex?
Men have never had any special terms for “promiscuous women.” Nope never. (Sorry, Mark, you were just fresh in my memory.)
Then Front Page, as is its wont, wants to move on from Madonna to ‘leftists’ and Islam.
For instance, when they start priding themselves on how they are for gay rights, which I also support on various realms, I tell them what the Old and New Testaments say about homosexuality and ask them what they think. They get all incensed and indignant. And then I ask them: are you willing to condemn these religions for this view? And they say yes and then they say the most insulting things about Christianity and Judaism. Then I bring up the Koran and start telling them what it says about homosexuality. Suddenly their moral indignation dissipates.
I don’t doubt that this is true of some people, but it ain’t me, babe. Some of us stand with Peter Tatchell who actually did criticise the Palestinian Authority on those grounds. I’ve posted on the Sikh protests against “Behzti.”
It’s a long, tedious interview, and I’m not going to go through it point by point.
Elsewhere young Ben turns his attention to the Jackson trial. (And I fear for Harvard Law School.)
Four days later, 400 Jackson fans gathered at the Chumash Casino in California to celebrate the pop star’s acquittal. One of those fans, Pauline Coccoz, was a juror in Jackson’s case; she cried as the casino blasted “Beat It” over the loudspeakers.
The facts: Jackson fans had been outside the court during the trial. They held a party when it was over. Possibly over 400 attended. (Perhaps 800 if the Met were charged with counting.) This doesn’t mean that everyone who attended was a fan. If Mr Shapiro wishes to allege that Ms Coccoz was a fan (rather than someone who had bought one of Jackson’s recordings), he has grounds for calling a mis-trail. Over to you, Ben.
Seventy-two years ago this month, former silent movie star Fatty Arbuckle died in his sleep at the age of 46. Twelve years earlier, Arbuckle had been accused of raping a young woman, Virginia Rappe, using a foreign object; supposedly, this had ruptured Rappe’s bladder, killing her. Despite the fact that Arbuckle was later acquitted of manslaughter after two hung juries, he was essentially blacklisted from Hollywood. His career was over.
Clearly, Arbuckle was the victim of injustice. Evidence strongly supports his innocence. But that was a different time and a different place: It was a place where even the suggestion of impropriety was enough to cause public scandal. It was a place where immorality was not tolerated. Judgmental? Yes. But was it better than today’s no-standards society, where known child molesters like Michael Jackson are celebrated after their acquittals? Absolutely.
Not tolerated?
The comedian had broken a law on the way to the infamous party: he had brought liquor to it. In 1922, he pled guilty to violating the Volstead Act and paid a $500 fine.
Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle had come to represent everything that was supposedly wrong with Hollywood. His very name conjured up the worst type of sexual predator, leading to his being the first person to be blacklisted from films. His very name conjured up the worst type of sexual predator, leading to his being the first person to be blacklisted from films. The films in which he starred had been withdrawn from circulation because of his, however undeservedly, sullied reputation. The major force behind this blacklisting was Will Hays.
Formerly U.S. postmaster general, Hays is best remembered for an organization dedicated to sanitizing the motion picture industry. It was called the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA). Hays and his organization were courted because Hollywood feared that public outrage would lead to government censorship. Movie producers decided to head that threat off at the pass by agreeing to rules of self-censorship which Hays helped form.
All about Fatty Arbuckle and the Death of Virginia Rappe. Young Shapiro goes on about the Hays code being “voluntary” — that’s in the gun-held-to-the-temple sense. As it happens, Arbuckle stayed in Hollywood: Roscoe Arbuckle’s work in Buster Keaton Related Projects; and Films Directed by Roscoe Arbuckle as William Goodrich.
Perhaps because he’s young, Ben doesn’t do irony.
A recent poll by AP/AOL showed that “most Americans think movie stars are poor role models and almost half say movies generally aren’t as good as they used to be.” Seventy-three percent of Americans would prefer to stay home and watch a DVD rather than go out to a movie.
And this would be a DVD of what? Not to mention that there are some films you can get on DVD they won’t show at the local multiplex. People have always said things ain’t what they used to be. Here’s the rub, I agree with the Great American Public about movie stars being poor role models. But who needs role models?
I have saved the world in movies
So naturally there’s some folks who think I must know what to do
But just because you’ve seen me on your TV
Doesn’t mean I’m any more enlightened than you …
So next time there’s an asteroid or a natural disaster
I’m flattered that you thought of me
But I’m not the one to call
William Shatner (words by Brad Paisley).
These 688 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:50pm GMT Permanent link.
Friday, 24 June 2005
Oops! »
My apologies for downtime. I got in from circuit training and found yet more spam in my referrer file. If you don’t care about referrer spam, the rest of this post will be very boring for you, and I advise you to skip it. I made a coding error, didn’t check the site, and was down for a couple of hours. C’est la vie.
I track, like some large percentage of blogs, where visitors come to this site from. (If you’re interested, and don’t know, the very short version is that your computer when it requests any file from a site sends a request which states several things, including what kind of software is requesting the page, where it got the address from, and so forth. (This can be useful information: if someone is downloading images from your site through requests from pages not on your site — a process called “hotlinking” — there is a way to stop them, which I may discuss another time.)
Spam comes in many forms (it’s an intentionally wooly word that way). There is email, as you cannot have failed to know. There are fake trackbacks and comments in blogs. And there is referrer spam, perhaps the strangest. This and fake comments in blogs are mostly ways of attracting Google, in the belief that Google ranks much-linked to sites more highly in its results. (This theory took a battering with the growth of blogs since 2002.) So the first thing which ought to interest our neighbourhood spammer is, does Google read my referrer page? (My traffic is too low to help any commercial enterprise.) Answer no. Here’s my robots.txt file (robots.txt tutorial).
User-agent: *
Disallow: /images/
Disallow: /referers.html
In short, this says to all ethical search-engines (which includes all the big ones), don’t index any images, and don’t index my referrer file. To put it another way, Google doesn’t spider (read) that page, so your link is wasted (besides wasting my bandwidth, which I object to). OK, I know what you’ll say, this means the teenage terrors have to bother to write a few lines of code to determine whether it’s worthwhile. True enough, and they’re probably not going to, so all I’ve got is the small pleasure that they wasted their efforts. So here’s a line of HTML from the referrer page itself.
24/06 10:15pm Backword www.nickbarlow.com/ blog/ 63.215.138.155 The ‘rel="nofollow"’ part means much the same as the robots.txt file: don’t index this link or add it to links to Nick Barlow’s site.
This is still wasted of course. So I ban the buggers.
# chris — changed 20050204
# previously this was configured to use mod_php, which is insecure and
# unsupported
AddType application/x-httpd-fastphp .php
AddType application/x-httpd-fastphp .html
Action application/x-httpd-fastphp /fcgi/php
DirectoryIndex index.html
order deny,allow
deny from all
order allow,deny
deny from 216.40.250.26
deny from 63.247.74.90
deny from 69.50.176.202
deny from 69.50.180.186
deny from 81.3.150.1
deny from 84.179.20.203
deny from 84.179.27.85
deny from 84.179.39.113
deny from 84.179.54.209
allow from all
Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://a-bargai* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.a-bargai* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://adipex* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.adipex* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://allaucti* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.allaucti* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://cialis* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.cialis* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://dating* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.dating* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://diaze* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.diaze* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://home.tis* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.home.tis* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://hydrocon* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.hydrocon* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://incest* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.incest* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://insuranc* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.insuranc* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://lortab* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.lortab* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://milf* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.milf* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://phent* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.phent* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://private-* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.private-* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://rape* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.rape* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://sex* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.sex* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://viagra* [OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} http://www.viagra*
RewriteRule ^.* - [F,L]
ErrorDocument 404 /notfound.html
ErrorDocument 410 /gone.html
That’s an .htaccess file (sorry, it only works on Apache). And I cocked it up. Where it says “allow from all” I had “deny from all.” This doesn’t mean that either I or my blog hate or have ever hated Justin of Chicken Yoghurt (though I managed to ban him by accident). I’m just overzealous of my bandwidth. Typical tight Scot.
These 645 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:56pm GMT Permanent link.
Saturday, 25 June 2005
All Passion Spent »
I’ve been in love more times than I care to remember.
Frank Sinatra
Last night in the pub I was rather hard on AC for calling someone I can’t stand a “devoted father.” DP was with me on this: “devoted” and “father” seem to be words that go together like a horse and carriage, with only the backside of the horse between.
Likewise “believe” and “passionately” — though this again is like Craig Brown’s irregular verbs, I believe passionately; you rant and rave; he blogs drunk/is Ian Paisley.
Chris Dillow has a marvellous post on Passionate Blair. His observation and diligence in collating the material are splendid as always, but I’m most impressed by Blimpish in the comments.
On your actual point — yes, all comes back to the need to be sincere, authentic, meaningful. Positivism again — values and facts cannot be conflated, so value judgements are judged according the will, resolve, and feeling behind them rather than their accord with any interpretation of the facts. It’s all very Existential.
I lean toward positivism, like a drunk to a lamppost, so I understand Blimpish’s point as an insider. And I know that intellectual passions, being entirely unrequited, rarely last as long as the courtship of the mayfly.
And Jamie adds:
Isn’t “passionate” part of the business school lexicon these days? As in: I’m in business because I’m passionate about dog grooming/industrial sponge/injection moulding equipment…
I’m sure he’s right. My agreement with Blimpish notwithstanding, it’s not a bad thing to be passionate about business, as I think this BBC piece on Gordon Ramsay shows. But then Ramsay’s a “show, don’t tell” (old Hollywood cliché; may just be William Goldman though) kind of guy. It’s just that the Prime Minister is best summed up by Bruce Forsythe (who is practically Molière compared to Phoney Tony’s choice of dining companions): “All mouth and trousers.”
These 223 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:45am GMT Permanent link.
Whatever Will They Think Of Next? »
The Guardian Onlineblog reports Microsoft bets RSS is next big thing with the Graun’s usual diligence, the entire story is sourced from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
Microsoft said yesterday that the Web browser in the next generation of Windows will be able to detect, display and subscribe to streams of news and information in a format called RSS, an increasingly popular method of receiving content online …
Wow!
There is some thigh-slapping sarcasm in the comments, too.
These 36 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 6:46pm GMT Permanent link.
Let The Jitters Begin »
It’s 7 o’clock. It’s Saturday.
AAAAAAAAARGHHHHHHH!
These 6 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 7:08pm GMT Permanent link.
He Used To Write For Me, You Know »
Norm profiles Powerliner “Deacon” who used to write here under the translated-for-parochial-Brits “Vicar” (with the memorable little icon on the right). Sadly, he’s known in conservative circles as the one who isn’t “Buttock Missile” or “Humungous Snake.” Remember, these guys are lawyers, attuned to every verbal nuance — except the obvious ones.
In one of those amazing co-incidences which happen sometimes, ‘Vicar"’s co-blogger, the one with the so-not-gay moniker appears in Kartoon form on the Poor Man (and isn’t it great he’s back?). Yessir, it’s Hindrocket!!.
Image stolen without permission, as some things are too good to resist.
As for the name thing, it’s just an invitation to take the piss. There’s an unforgivable naivety in someone who doesn’t realise that. (If Michael Jackson had employed these losers on his defence case, he’d have been deported to Tehran by now. (Isn’t that where “questions get asked” without this “human rights nonsense” getting in the way?) The same thing applies to the name change at the DTI (as was, then wasn’t, then was again). Making mock isn’t just a British oh-we’re-so-envious-of-success thing, BTW. The splendid Scott Adams has been on eight-cylinder vituperative form all week. (Starting here, perhaps, though he’s rarely less than brilliant.) Being a hot-shot lawyer or a government minister or a CEO doesn’t get you love. Well, it might get you Faria Alam. (Thinks: “Hold on, why wasn’t I more ambitious? My IQ is nugatory, my talents are few. I could have risen to the top with the rest of the … I coulda been a contender! Eheu!")
These 263 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 9:35pm GMT Permanent link.
18 Out Of 20 »
My answers to tachyon tv’s Twenty Questions on Doctor Who.
- Favourite episode: probably The Doctor Dances, despite my initial doubts. It firmed up the relationship between Rose and the Doctor, and had a powerful feel-good ending.
- Least favourite episode: Rose. It was good enough to watch the rest, but it seems much weaker and less convincing that subsequent adventures.
- Favourite supporting actor (male): Shaun Dingwall as Pete Tyler (Rose’s dad). No question.
- Favourite supporting actor (female): If we’re talking horn here, and this is fanboy stuff, so we are, then Christine Adams as Cathica in The Long Game. If we’re talking character, then Anna Maxwell-Martin, for having incredible eyes and playing an anarchist in the same episode. Otherwise Annette Badland in Boom Town.
- Least favourite supporting actor: None.
- Best line of Doctor dialogue: "I have my moments.” (Asked by Richard Williams if he was a doctor.)
- Best line of dialogue (non-Doctor): "Sometimes a duffle coat is just a duffle coat.” Pete Tyler.
- Worst line of dialogue (anyone): The Doctor, apparently time-lagged, in “Bad Wolf": sonar doesn’t work in a vacuum (ie space).
- Best scene or sequence: I’ll go with the kisses in the final episode. But if I’m allowed a top three (I know I’m not), also the Doctor dying in “Father’s Day” and ditto Rose in “Bad Wolf.” All “Fuck me, they can’t do that!” moments.
- Best singular image from series: Daleks at the end of “Bad Wolf” — brought back my prepubescent Dalek fandom.
- Funniest moment or dialogue: "Well, there is a war on. It is possible you may have miscounted?” ("The Doctor Dances.")
- Scariest moment: Rose’s death.
- Saddest moment: Rose’s dad’s “I’m supposed to be dead."
- Bit that made the least sense or you wished they’d cut: The arm in “Rose."
- Best special effect: Not a special effect per se, but the removal of the gas mask from Jamie.
- Worst special effect: None. I don’t agree with everyone else on the CGI Slitheen. I thought they were brilliant.
- Favourite director: I really didn’t pay attention.
- Favourite writer: Russell T Davies, for all the details. The ‘pizza’ dialogue, or David Tenant’s line about teeth.
That’s only 18, but I can’t be bothered with the last two.
Regrets, I’ve had a few. Why the hell didn’t I attack Christopher Eccleston with ridiculous fan boy praise? There is a lot of television about, and only a very small percentage is any good. If I had to pick comparisons with Eccleston, I’d go for James Gandolfini in The Sopranos and Al Pacino in Angels in America. He may yet be better than either. (And “better than Al Pacino” is the sort of sentence which is only grammatical if it ends with “at synchronised swimming.")
I’ve slagged off “moral” nerds like Ben Shapiro in the past, but if I had kids, I’d monitor what they watched. (On the understanding that I was a kid once, and I thought my parents naive, wrong-headed, censorious, and so forth, so being at all heavy is counter-productive.) I approve fully of the moral ambitions of Doctor Who. Ambitions which I think it’s worth discussing and dissecting with children.
I think Billy Piper’s Rose character, who is supposed to be the audience’s way in to the Doctor was particularly splendid. She’s a game girl, she fights the Autons in episode 1. She asks questions. She’s loyal (if also critical and clear-sighted). When she meets self-abasing servants in The End of the World, she could be all superior and snotty, the way many people are when they gain unexpected power, but she sticks with her ingrained democratic impulses: be polite to everyone. She’s willing to grow. She makes mistakes (Adam in “Dalek” and “The Long Game” but the Doctor explains that’s what it’s all about). She’s morally wrong once in the series in my count: she’s brutally insensitive to Mickey in the final episode, but she’s deeply upset, so it’s understandable (forgivable depends on your moral compass).
Rose isn’t perfect: she takes advantage of Mickey, and is taken advantage of by Captain Jack (in The Empty Child), but none of us are. If she sees a child in trouble (same episode), she doesn’t think. There isn’t an afterlife or anything like in the series. Rose’s dad dies so that others may live, not for any reward. Rose does the right thing, because it’s the right thing. If I had children, that’s the moral code I’d wish them to learn. Given that I’m 43, so should I have children, I’d be quite old and I won’t see my grandchildren, BUT if my son looked even likely to obey voices in his head and sacrifice his son, I hope I’d strangle him or at least commit to some asylum where they’d drug him to paralysis, because that’s not morality, that’s schizophrenia. The Bible teaches genocide (against the Pharisees, the Philistines, the Egyptians, the Palestinians). It’s got some nice prose though, and there are some good hymns.
These 828 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:54pm GMT Permanent link.
I ♥ John Barrowman »
He’s a bastard: he’s younger and better looking than me, and he can sing. But I ♥ John Barrowman.
June 19th — John will start the charity ‘Walk For Life’ … London, in aid of Crusaid.
He’s a good bloke. He’s not an “out of bounds” sort of guy.
These 35 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:17pm GMT Permanent link.
Monday, 27 June 2005
Like Shooting Messengers In A Barrel »
Blogging will eat itself. Today, I will mostly be blogging on BBC reports on reports.
Blair ‘confident’ over ID cards. The LSE has released a report (links to PDF versions of the summary and the whole thing are on the BBC page) criticising the government’s plans for ID cards. As the BBC puts it:
According to the London School of Economics the scheme could cost £18bn — triple government estimates of £6bn.
Not that ministers accept this.
Immigration Minister Tony McNulty told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the LSE figures “simply don’t stack up”.
“There’s double counting, increases in levels of staff and various other elements that simply don’t ring true,” he said.
What does seem to be indisputable (to me, anyway) is that any national government project which involves computers runs several factors over budget. So tripling the first estimate seems a practical rule of thumb, as much as anything. Not assuming incompetence, stupidity, and greed doesn’t ring true. The report’s “Summary of Conclusions” states:
Any system that supports critical security functions must be robust and resilient to malicious attacks. Because of its size and complexity, the identity system would require security measures at a scale that will result in substantially higher implementation and operational costs than has been estimated. The proposed use of the system for a variety of purposes, and access to it from a large number of private and public sector organisations will require unprecedented attention to security.
All identity systems carry consequential dangers as well as potential benefits. Depending on the model used, identity systems may create a range of new and unforeseen problems. These include the failure of systems, unforeseen financial costs, increased security threats and unacceptable imposition on citizens.
Blair, of course, shrugs all this off.
“No government is going to start introducing something that’s going to cost hundreds of pounds to people — that would be ridiculous.
“But there are good reasons for doing this now, because of the change to technology, the fact that we will have to pay for biometric passports and the ID card part of it is a very small additional cost.”
But it’s not ridiculous. Governments do introduce expensive things — all the time. The Thatcher government introduced the poll tax, which cost “hundreds of pounds to people.” How much did the Scottish Parliament cost? It’s not at all ridiculous to put a high price on security and life, and terror or crime preventing measures can justify their costs. Being a pedant, I’d much rather that Mr Blair had said “I will not introduce ‘something that’s going to cost hundreds of pounds to people’” that would look like an assurance.
But we don’t have to pay for biometric passports. We’re not required to travel abroad. If you holiday in Butlin’s you don’t have to have a passport. And even then, thirty quid isn’t a small additional cost.
Does anyone want to bet that ID cards will be delivered on budget?
Then there’s Report slams Bush space vision.
President Bush’s vision for human space exploration is doomed to fail without a major injection of funding and changes in space policy, according to a report.
The paper, by two influential experts, says current US space policy “presents a paradoxical picture of high ambition and diminishing commitment”.
Again the critics are not without critics of their own.
But others have drawn attention to the authors’ past democrat associations.
I think that should be capital-D Democrats, supporting universal franchise (except in our allies in The War Against Turr) is hardly grounds for dismissing their conclusions.
Again, any bets on Richard Branson getting astronauts to Mars before NASA does?
These 314 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:51pm GMT Permanent link.
Keep Them Worlds Apart »
I found Clive Davis through Tim Worstall’s splendid Britblog Roundup. Clive has posted on numerous things which interest me and from a usefully different angle.
He defends the BBC from Jeff Jarvis. And quite right too. Here’s JJ:
In Britain, the news nannies are using delays to protect the people from… news! …
Incredible. What do they think they’re protecting the public from? The acts of evil terrorists? What is served by softening that? Softening the terrorists?
And here’s Clive:
I don’t see anything wrong with a time delay if it’s going to prevent live broadcasts of terrorists decapitating hostages or attempting to send messages to supporters. We don’t need gore for gore’s sake.
Exactly. If someone’s going to film a decapitation, then they want it broadcast. Not broadcasting may well be the way to go, (Even though I suspect that such people may be quite wrong about the effect of the broadcast, this still doesn’t mean that any news station should call their bluff.) Secondly, the victims have family. Jamie Kenny posted on image censorship in the print media, and in this I go along with the Telegraph. I wouldn’t like to see a severed body part of a friend or family member displayed as infotainment.
Clive continues the defence.
As for that word “terrorist”, well, I still think that “insurgent” is more appropriate in the context of Iraq. As a Fox News fan, I don’t mind all that much when breakfast show anchors breezily talk about attacks by “bad guys”. But Fox is addressing a specific, homogeneous audience. The BBC has a different job to do.
Day-umm, I’m such a liberal:
Of course, Rumsfeld was quick to say these talks weren’t with terrorists, merely with the Baathists who kill US troops without putting on uniforms to do so, plant car bombs among civilians, and assassinate policemen and politicians. Only some kind of liberal would mistake those tactics for terrorism.
Andrew Brown, quoted by Mike Power. So Donald Rumsfeld won’t use the word “terrorist.” He’s a mad old turr supporter, and he once shook hands with Saddam. We wait for the savaging from Jeff the attack chihuahua!
This wasn’t what I wanted to post on. Clive also writes on the soon-to-be-released “War of the Worlds”. In the TV trailer someone says something like, “They’ve been planning this for a million years.” I don’t remember the Martians in the book ever explaining their motives or speaking at all (their intellectual superiority was deduced entirely from their arrival). Of course, a million years ago, there were hardly any humans to invade. But the premise of the movie (that Cruise fights off the Martians) is a travesty of the book. (He presumably does so by walking through specially made doors:
I ask because a few years ago on a trip to California I saw two doorframes in a back-lot at the Paramount Studios in Hollywood. They were identical, except that one was a smaller version of the other. I asked a passing stagehand what they were for. They had been used in the film Top Gun, he explained, the smaller one was for Tom Cruise to walk through, the taller one for his co-star, Kelly McGillis. Haunting story, isn’t it?)
This is disappointing because Spielberg has directed good SF adaptations: Artificial Intelligence: AI and Minority Report.
Later, Clive links to a (doubtless free for only a short period) uncharacteristically sensible Bryan Appleyard piece in the Times, which points out that if Wells’ utopianism and social criticism floated between misguided and silly, so did all his contemporaries.
But Wells was a giant in imagination. At the time that the motor car was starting to spread, he depicted alien vehicles on legs. There were death rays, though there was nothing in science (expect perhaps, early studies of radioactivity) to suggest them. The point was that there wasn’t a resistance. The Martians came, massacred, and died. (He had the right idea there.) Wells deserved better than this.
These 409 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:54pm GMT Permanent link.
Tuesday, 28 June 2005
The Ordinary Folk Against The Rising Tide Of Filth In Our Society Situation »
The trouble with obituaries is they only print them after you’re dead. There is a special frisson on reading obits like the one of William Donaldson in the Telegraph.
Root chastised the Archbishop of Canterbury for failing to thank him for the five pounds he had donated towards roof repairs; suggested to Margaret Thatcher (who kept the enclosed one pound) that Mary Whitehouse should be made Home Secretary; sympathised with the Queen about the “problems” she was having with Princess Anne ("My Doreen, 19, is completely off the rails too, so I know what it’s like"); and told the Thorpe trial judge, Sir Joseph Cantley: “You tipped the jury the right way and some of your jokes were first class! Well done! You never looked to me like the sort of man who’d send an old Etonian to the pokey”, a communication which brought a visit from the police, investigating allegations of attempted bribery.
He volunteered to run sundry failing football clubs; to visit the Chief Constable of Manchester with his newly formed-group The Ordinary Folk Against The Rising Tide of Filth in Our Society Situation (TOFATRFLOSS); asked Angela Rippon to send him a photograph of Anna Ford and enquired of the Tory Party director of finance the going rate for a peerage. He wrote to the late Sir James Goldsmith urging the elimination of “scroungers, perverts, Dutch pessary salesmen and Polly Toynbee”. “Dear Mr Root”, Goldsmith replied, “Thank you for your letter which I appreciated enormously.”
Even more wonderfully, his natural mode of expression was at odds with that paper’s style guide.
He was also the first promoter to arrange a Bob Dylan concert at a time when the singer was barely known in Britain. “He [Dylan] was sitting in my office one day when I came back from lunch,” Donaldson recalled. “I couldn’t get rid of the f***er.”
He had a constant stream of splendid ideas.
His books kept him in the limelight. In The Heart Felt Letters (1998) under the pseudonym “Liz Reed” of Heartfelt productions (company motto: “a tragedy aired is a tragedy shared") Donaldson pitched proposals for television shows to Dawn Airey at Channel 5, including such gems as Topless Gladiators, with the former Judge Pickles acting as arbitrator; succeeded in involving the Dean of St Paul’s in a Princess Diana “Compassion video” (featuring Esther Rantzen and a group of grieving mothers reciting prayers over footage of catastrophes), and offered James Boyle at Radio 4 a game show with “in the hot seat a celeb, who in spite of mega achievements, is thought by everyone to be a total pillock. Jeffrey Archer, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Janet Street-Porter… ”
These 53 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 11:53am GMT Permanent link.
Monsters From The ID »
Doc Ostrow: Monsters. Monsters from the id.
That is a particularly bad pun. But I’m feeling dull today. At least it reminded me of:
Dr. Edward Morbius: My evil self is at the door, and I have no power to stop it.
Now, that’s what I call dialogue.
Both Tom Watson and the BBC poll response to ID cards. See if you can see the common factor.
Yes, why not. Provided it is funded from general taxation and I am never asked for it when paying in the supermarket etc. Only government use should be allowed.
’Carl’ on Tom Watson. The rest are on the Beeb.
I have no problem in having an ID card. I do have a problem in paying for it. There is no way I can afford the £300. If the government wants us to have one, then they can pay for it.
’Rosie’
In principal [sic] I have no objection to carrying an ID card as I already carry other forms of identification. However, I strongly object to having to pay for it.
’Jeffrey White’
Absolutely no problems to having an ID card, but I do have major issues about having to pay for them. If the government wants us to have these cards, then the government should pay for them.
’Emma’
IDs could be free because money droppeth into the government like the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath. The government should pay! What an elegant solution. We keep our money … er, there’s a problem with this somewhere.
Among the very few ‘yea’ sayers on Tom Watson, some appear to believe that banks will become more efficient with government help. If my bank let someone else spend all money, I’d change banks. (Plus the poor guy got it back after a week. Now if he went to Treasury, it might take a little longer.)
I doubt that Tom Watson’s vote will be affected by his comments, but at least he asked.
Yes or No to ID cards? No essays please. A yes or no and your justification in no more than 30 words will suffice.
And a ‘yes’:
Yes. Given the current nature of the blogosphere the ‘No’ vote is only to be expected. It certainly doesn’t reflect the diversity of opinion that I hear when out in the community. The ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ camp appear to be pretty evenly divided between those who see all the personal advantages, and those concerned about either civil liberties (smallish) and cost (much larger group).
Do you see the justification? Me neither. I don’t know what the “personal advantages” are. (I think there were advantages to the “Final Solution” — cheap labour, freeing up the property market, fewer troublesome smartarse lefties in universities.) What a surprise that Stuart Bruce turns out to be a New Labour hack.
’Peter’ suggests:
Matt Nailon, Bath, UK- our forebears during WWII all carried an ID card and were used to being asked to show it by policemen or when collecting rations. ID cards protected us, they are not an instrument of oppression.
And ‘Mike’ points out.
This paranoia is totally out of proportion. Germany has had ID cards for years, where they are accepted as a sensible way to determine someone’s identity.
Would it be churlish to note that the Germans’ forebears carried ID cards and were used to producing them? The British loved those ARP wardens and policemen. (Pictured: the ever-popular warden in “Dad’s Army.” A much-missed figure from happier days.)
These 273 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:40pm GMT Permanent link.
Wednesday, 29 June 2005
In Praise Of Religious Persecution »
Quite a few people have objected to Mark Lawson’s use of the word “theocracy” to describe the US. An American replies:
I like how they keep saying the science isn’t in on global warming. They just don’t know. No proof. But, of course, it’s in on God. Lots of proof on that. Tons of empirical evidence. They got God’s DNA. And Moses parted the Red Sea. He said, “Open sea,” and it opened. And Jesus walked on water. Those are some tricks. People must have been after Moses to do it again until he finally got sick of them and lost his temper. “No, I’m not parting it again, now leave me alone.” “C’mon Moses, please?” “I said no, now get the hell outta here!” You’d think anyone who believes this stuff would be so embarassed they’d keep it to themselves. But those maniacs shout it from the rooftops and they’re running our country. God talks to Bush all the time. I don’t care if you’re President, if you say God talks to you, you’re a schizophrenic and a menace to society. You should be on drugs in a mental institution, like the Son of Sam. What’s the difference between God or a dog talking to you? It’s still a voice in your head. That means you’re certifiably fucking crazy! … Look what they’re doing to me. Take a deep breath. That’s good. Listen to your breathing. That’s a meditation technique. Clears your mind. There’s a breath, that’s good. There’s another breath. I guess the science isn’t in on evolution either… No, come on, breathe. There’s a breath. Of course the planet’s only 5000 years old. Breathe, prick, breathe. What about the fucking dinosaurs?! We have the bones. They know how old the bones are! The sad thing is these nuts who founded this country fled Europe because of religious persecution. Good trade for Europe.
The Roving Thoughts of a Liberal Insomniac. Some liberal! He referred his wife as “Hitler," and wrote scripts about Nazis.
Only the churches can save us from the abyss his "no hugs, no learning" philosophy threatened to hurl us into. Right that’s it. No waiting. If the Bastard BBC won’t show Curb Your Enthusiasm at a reasonable hour, I’m just going to have to buy the sodding DVDs.
These 89 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 10:34am GMT Permanent link.
For David Duff, Among Others »
David Duff, curmudgeon extraordinare, believes we all need a little more discipline. Hmmm. Here’s a lovely email to Andrew Sullivan.
“Senator Santorum proposes an interesting hypothesis [link added by me for clarity] regarding the sexual abuse of children by Roman Cathoic clergy based on his experience in the USA. I live in Ireland where we have had an equally serious problem, but in a society which was, until very recently, Roman Catholic in everyway the Senator could wish for. Yet the sexual abuse of children by Catholic clergy was rampant here during the period when Catholic moral teaching was universally accepted by the general population, and enforced by the state through its civil and criminal law. When I moved to the Republic of Ireland in 1990 contraceptives were illegal – with the exception of condoms, these being available to married couples at the discretion of their family doctors. Girls who had babies out of wedlock were commonly incarcerated in Church-run ‘Magdalen Laundries’ for the rest of their lives, and their children adopted or kept in children’s homes were they were easy prey for pedophile priests. Homosexuality was so thoroughly driven underground that I know people my age (now 41) that had never heard of it, and the Irish language had no word for it. 99% of schools were Catholic, 90% of the population were weekly mass goers and monthly confession was the norm for the majority. Divorce was banned by the constitution. There was no “plague of cultural liberalism”; there was no liberalism at all! It was almost a perfect Catholic State.
Yet the physical and sexual abuse of children by Catholic clergy was rampant. Indeed it has been the exposure of these crimes that has revolutionized Irish society in the course of 10 years. In the past 10 years the Catholic Church’s standing in Ireland has totally collapsed. Now the state-run TV service carries adverts encouraging contraception. Homosexuality is now legal, gay couples are common and unremarkable, the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) is a separated man who lives with a woman he is not married to. This is not remarkable to anyone. Mass attendance though still high by international standards, has plummeted, and there aren’t enough seminarians in the country to fill a booth in my local ‘Eddie Rocket’s’ diner. Irish society has never been so open, liberal, pluralistic, and so safe for our children. Senator Rick Santorum could not be more wrong. Liberalism has been good for Ireland culturally and economically, our children are well educated, confident and much much less likely to suffer sexual abuse at the hands of Catholic priests.”
And there’s an interesting little story in the Torygraph’s breaking news. Let’s do the background:
The family were popular in the local area, with Mrs Blackwell an active member of the church, who also wrote poems for a community newsletter.
Mr Blackwell, who used his middle name Brian, took pride in his well-maintained home and garden.
The couple had high expectations for their son, telling people he was destined to become “not just a doctor — a surgeon”.
They were well off:
The couple took frequent holidays to Spain and neighbours were not at first suspicious about their absence.
They send their son to the “£7,000-a-year Liverpool College.”
Two parents, church-going, living in an “affluent village”, with a son who was “described as ‘exemplary’ by his former teachers.” Then there’s the unpleasant part:
Inside the house detectives discovered a bloodbath. The couple’s injuries were so extensive that at first police thought they may have been shot.
It was the son, of course. This was after:
He created a web of lies about his life, including claiming he was a professional tennis player, and funded his fantasies by applying for 13 credit cards in his father’s name.
Following their deaths he went on holiday to America with his girlfriend Amal Saba, where he embarked on a £30,000 spending spree, including £2,200 on a three-night stay in the Presidential Suite of the Plaza Hotel in New York.
I don’t think this shows anything, beyond the world being full of crazy people. (You’d have to be mad to do a thing like that, but I’m a bit doubtful about the psychatric diagnosis.) However, I’m convinced that the country won’t be fixed by two-parent families, “traditional morality,” and compulsory short hair.
These 134 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 2:40pm GMT Permanent link.
Thursday, 30 June 2005
Meaningless Words »
I’m sure this will go down very badly with the blogosphere in general, but Justin raised “Mr Decency-Pants” as (Jamie calls him).
Meaningless words. In certain kinds of writing, particularly in art criticism and literary criticism, it is normal to come across long passages which are almost completely lacking in meaning. Words like romantic, plastic, values, human, dead, sentimental, natural, vitality , as used in art criticism, are strictly meaningless, in the sense that they not only do not point to any discoverable object, but are hardly ever expected to do so by the reader. When one critic writes, “The outstanding feature of Mr. X’s work is its living quality,” while another writes, “The immediately striking thing about Mr. X’s work is its peculiar deadness,” the reader accepts this as a simple difference opinion. If words like black and white were involved, instead of the jargon words dead and living, he would see at once that language was being used in an improper way. Many political words are similarly abused. The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies “something not desirable.” The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another. In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using that word if it were tied down to any one meaning. Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different. Statements like Marshal Petain was a true patriot, The Soviet press is the freest in the world, The Catholic Church is opposed to persecution, are almost always made with intent to deceive. Other words used in variable meanings, in most cases more or less dishonestly, are: class, totalitarian, science, progressive, reactionary, bourgeois, equality.
Politics and the English Language.
Architects unveil New York’s new Freedom Tower.
In an enjoyably pompous editorial celebrating its 151st year, the Torygraph leader described itself and its readers thus:
From its earliest days, the paper had a distinctive voice, instantly recognisable, which its readers liked. Those who liked it, then as now, were people who hated being bossed about.
Well, don’t we all? One of the great things about the Torygraph is that it prints obits like this, which I linked to before (and was picked up by Jamie who saw several other merits; now might be a good time that Carly Simon was the first woman I ever fancied, so whatever his comedy qualities, Donaldson was unquestionably a bastard). The blue-bloods in Canary Wharf seem to honour Mrs T less than, oh, several “lefty” bloggers I can think of (OK, Kamm, Pollard, and crew), and a Prime Minister whose name escapes me.
Hang on, here’s a chap with a hint, the sketch writer Andrew Gimson.
The best riposte to this was given by David Davis, the shadow home secretary, who said of the proposed law: “A vision like this was originally set out by a man called Blair who changed his name to Orwell and wrote a book called 1984. It was supposed to be a warning, not a textbook.”
Roll on the Tory leadership contest, eh?
As Mr Davis observed, there is an “intrinsic dishonesty” in the way the Government is promoting ID cards as a voluntary measure when it plainly intends to make them compulsory—an intention the Home Secretary had already been forced to admit when interrupted by Geraldine Smith (Lab, Morecambe and Lunesdale), who pointed out the absurdity of his claim that voluntary ID cards could help to control people trafficking.
Mr Clarke is much too intelligent to imagine that he got the best of this argument.
As the afternoon wore on, he resorted to covering his grizzled features with his hands, as if finding it hard to face further evidence that his scheme is hopelessly impracticable as well as offensive in principle.
Speaking of Mr Clarke, there was splendid letter which I failed to blog about.
I mentioned Justin earlier, and in a comment (while they’re still allowed!) on “Tory” Tim Ireland’s Bloggerheads, he seems to think this picture has some meaning for democrats, progressives, socialists and so forth. Maybe it’s the redefinition thing. Maybe I’m being a bore.
When one knew that any document was due for destruction, or even when one saw a scrap of waste paper lying about, it was an automatic action to lift the flap of the nearest memory hole and drop it in, whereupon it would be whirled away on a current of warm air to the enormous furnaces which were hidden somewhere in the recesses of the building.
Dan - I can confirm that you were banned for being a bore. …
Posted by Harry on June 28, 2005 10:16 PM.
…
Really? In email, Marcus told me that it was for “persistent personal insults”. Perhaps you were just being polite, though in the circumstances I doubt it.
Posted by dsquared on June 28, 2005 11:27 PM.
UK blogosphere rules, ok?, on the Observer blog.
These 234 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:00am GMT Permanent link.
In Which I Trump John Band »
Ah, the last post did the usual commodius vicus of recirculation thing, or Molly Bloom with punctuation, if you prefer, in which I hop from link to irresistible link (set up earlier in the day) like a frog with piles, but no more direction. I forgot to mention that, whatever the architects may promise, the “Freedom Tower” in Manhattan will never be invulnerable to nuclear fallout, a tsunami, biological weapons, a largish meteorite, Daleks, or the total collapse of the US Dollar because a lot of inbred retarded folk pulled the wrong level in November last year, leaving a recovering drug and alcohol addict whose colossal stupidity would disgrace the House of Lords never mind the Drones Club in charge of the erstwhile strongest economy on the planet. (Like dear old Molly yes I gave the elbow to the comma back there.)
Ah yes. John Band, you’re way behind with your On shooting unarmed students. Charles Johnson makes everyone with feelings almost pine for the honesty of the old days of lynchings and castrations in good old Dixie. James Wolcott worries about “respectable bloggers” (one is fat; one wears a hat) Are Roger L. Simon and Glenn Reynolds Endorsing Violence Against Journalists?
These 202 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 12:24am GMT Permanent link.
The War Of The Worlds: The Good Bits »
I had a project for yesterday: this is it. Why let Chris Brooke have all the fun with old texts (as we post-modernists say)? I reread the H.G. Wells novel yesterday on Tuesday. Passages struck me as worth quoting as I read, but they mounted up. I don’t think this blog is the place to criticise what’s wrong with the book (I’d need a reading-list of examples to show where it could have been done better), but it can at least record some of the ‘intellectual’ stuff and perhaps suggest why a fairly stupid novel has remained in print for over a century, been filmed several times, and been read by me twice now.
One thing that stands out to me: the action occurs around London (the Martians’ cylinder firing is very accurate), but a lot of the suspense and details Wells works on depend on the absence of news. Though the narrator’s brother is only a few miles away in London itself, he has no idea that aliens have invaded the commuter belt. Newspapers are sold at a premium.
In Wellington Street my brother met a couple of sturdy roughs who had just been rushed out of Fleet Street with still-wet newspapers and staring placards. “Dreadful catastrophe!” they bawled one to the other down Wellington Street. “Fight ing at Weybridge! Full description! Repulse of the Martians! London in Danger!” He had to give threepence for a copy of that paper.
Book 1, XIV In London. Then prices went up:
Unable from his window to learn what was happening, my brother went down and out into the street, just as the sky between the parapets of the houses grew pink with the early dawn. The flying people on foot and in vehicles grew more numerous every moment. “Black Smoke!” he heard people crying, and again “Black Smoke!” The contagion of such a unanimous fear was inevitable. As my brother hesitated on the door-step, he saw another news vender approaching, and got a paper forthwith. The man was running away with the rest, and selling his papers for a shilling each as he ran—a grotesque mingling of profit and panic.
Ibid.
Part of the point of the Orson Welles transmission was the change in the media. I’m less interested in Wells’ understanding of Adam Smith though, than I am in his other political ideas. There’s been talk that the Speilberg film supports the Iraq insurgents in some form. Not having seen it, I can’t comment, but the book does carry political messages.
The first a modern reader may notice is the snobbery. “… a couple of sturdy roughs” [above] (the word “roughs” appears quite a few times) and:
Among these were a couple of cyclists, a jobbing gardener I employed sometimes, a girl carrying a baby, Gregg the butcher and his little boy, and two or three loafers and golf caddies who were accustomed to hang about the railway station.
Book 1, III On Horsell Common.
And now for the political stuff:
And before we judge of them too harshly we must remember what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought, not only upon animals, such as the vanished bison and the dodo, but upon its inferior races. The Tasmanians, in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the space of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit?
Book 1, I The Eve of the War. (I fancy the whole point of the first chapter of the adventure is to educate the reader, Make him think, “Eh? What? The ‘European immigrants’ did that? The beasts!")
But the Martian machine took no more notice for the moment of the people running this way and that than a man would of the confusion of ants in a nest against which his foot has kicked. When, half suffocated, I raised my head above water, the Martian’s hood pointed at the batteries that were still firing across the river, and as it advanced it swung loose what must have been the generator of the Heat-Ray.
Book 1, XII What I Saw of the Destruction of Weybridge and Shepperton.
“This isn’t a war,” said the artilleryman. “It never was a war, any more than there’s war between man and ants.”
Book 2, VII The Man on Putney Hill.
Very gently, when my mind was assured again, did they break to me what they had learned of the fate of Leatherhead. Two days after I was imprisoned it had been destroyed, with every soul in it, by a Martian. He had swept it out of existence, as it seemed, without any provocation, as a boy might crush an ant hill, in the mere wantonness of power.
Book 2, IX Wreckage. It’s Like stepping on an anthill!
More tomorrow.
These 359 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 1:17am GMT Permanent link.
Oh, Boris, Boris, Boris »
The fragrant Melissa must be slacking off; Boris Johnson’s Telegraph column isn’t up on his site yet. Maybe she fears … well, we’ll come to that in a minute. The old boy is on amusing form this morning, asking Why do these mass-murdering commies get such a good press?
Just to prove my theory that commie tyranny was still chic, I sent a Spectator assistant to Camden Lock market, and she returned shining-eyed, with tales of hammer and sickle T-shirts, and laden with badges of the foremost commie creeps of history. There was a badge of Lenin — good old Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. He was responsible for killing about five million people, but a Lenin badge is obviously cool, as cool as hanging out and showing your midriff in the new chain of vodka bars called “Soviet”. She had a badge of Castro. Charismatic old Fidel. Yours to pin to your nipple for only £1.99.
They work ‘em hard at the Speccie, Camden Lock market, now that’s a research assignment. (It’s not what it was when I were young, you know.) I’m sure able young women like Melissa and the unnamed assistant only attach themselves to the Tory Party in the hunt for brainless young swains with half a chin and three-quarters of Norfolk. Now what might Melissa worry about? Bloggers? Nah.
Years ago, when he was governor of Texas, I flew out with William Hague on a fact-finder to his lair in Austin. Dubya’s buzzard eye alighted on my watch, which was decorated, to my eternal shame, with a picture of Che Guevara. “Gee,” he said, or words to that effect, “what’s with the wristband?” and he went on to warn me that some folks he knew didn’t think highly of Che.
Do I even need to tell you with political magazine editor, former opposition front bencher, and general good egg wrote those words. Now, about Camden Market? Are Che watches cheap there, or should I go up west?
These 153 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 9:17am GMT Permanent link.
There's Only One John Smith »
Well, that’s probably inaccurate, put like that. There’s only one John Smith in the Parliamentary Labour Party, since his namesake dropped off the perch. And he’s a brick, a chip off the old block, a good ‘un.
LIFELONG Labour loyalist John Smith voted against his Government over identity cards to warn ministers they are “sleep walking to disaster” over proposals he branded “unworkable, costly and unpopular”.
The Vale of Glamorgan MP was a surprise name among the 20 Labour rebels who voted against the Identity Cards Bill’s Second Reading - cutting the Government’s majority to 31.
Mr Smith defied a three-line whip to “take and stand” — saying it was in the interests not only of his constituents but the Labour Party itself.
“This is the only time I have every voted against the Labour Government,” he said, “I am a genetic loyalist from my earliest days as a union convener.
We’ll pass over Kirsty Buchanan of the Western Mail’s apparent lack of familiarity of common cliché. Mr Smith did abstain over the Iraq War (so he’s clearly a good lad at heart), but this is his first rebellion. He sounds unhappy.
Mr Smith said when Tony Blair returned from the campaign trail he had appeared willing to listen to the disillusioned voters who had turned away from the party, cutting Labour’s parliamentary majority from 161 seats to 66.
And he was “greatly encouraged” by the Prime Minister’s first address to the Parliamentary Labour Party, but Mr Smith warned forcing though the “dog’s breakfast” proposal revealed a Government still unwilling to heed the humbling message of May 5.
“There was a significant protest vote in the election which was not necessarily an anti-Labour vote,” he said.
“In my constituency one in 20 voters left us for alternative parties because they were disillusioned with the style of government and this is a first-class example that there is not much listening going on.”
By Jove, I think he gets it!
“In my judgment, we are making a disastrous error which is going to create serious problems for us down the line if this becomes law.”
I completely agree. One has to be optimistic about something you know.
These 97 words were hurriedly scribbled by Dave @ 4:51pm GMT Permanent link.