Reflections on life at “De Witte Wand”…

Category: News and politics

  • Lost in Transit

    A quite staggeringly stupid thing to do – lose two CDs containing the bank details and national insurance numbers of 10 million individuals. Diamond Geezer imagines the likely outcome.
  • John and Tony

    Today, while rummaging through the bran-tub that is the Web, I came across two stories that made me pause and reflect. The first is Peter Wilby’s review of John Simpson’s autobiography: Not Quite World’s End in today’s Guardian. I like John Simpson. Probably more pertinently, I trust John Simpson. When he speaks, I tend to listen, and find his words meaningful.
     
    Now, Wilby’s review points out some of the more sentimental and woolly side of Simpson, complete with some potentially rather un-PC sexism ("Fatherhood – and we perhaps shouldn’t inquire too closely into why two daughters from an earlier marriage didn’t have this effect – has "utterly" changed his view of the world, and particularly of war and death"). But still, the end result is that I continue to trust Simpson, and I’m tempted to purchase his memoir to read for myself.
     
    That memoir, as Wilby says, apparently: "…combines meticulous reporting with attitude. Much of it can be read as an epitaph to the foreign adventures of the Blair era and, as such, it is fair, forensic and utterly devastating".
     
    Which brings me on to Tony.
     
    Unlike my attitude to Simpson, "trust" is no longer a word I personally could now ever associate with Blair. My response to him, from the halycon days of 1997 when I truly believed that Britain was poised to take a step forward, has been poisoned by his deeds and has undergone a complete volte face. Now, he is a "peace envoy" for the Middle East Quartet. yet his language at this event is hardly pitched to be diplomatic. Instead of working for peace he seems determined to pile up the bonfire for the conflagration.  
  • Down The Toilet

    What in heaven’s name has happened to The Observer? This was once a quality Sunday newspaper. But today it carries what at first glance seems to be a serious news story about forensic analysis. However, Ben Goldacre points out the facts. The journalists in question, Mark Townsend and Ned Temko should hang their heads in shame. Disgraceful, truly disgraceful.
  • Prinsjesdag 2007

    Today was the day when Queen Beatrix formally opened the Dutch Parliament. Prinsjesdag, as it’s called, is similar to the State Opening of the British Parliament – an excuse for pomp and circumstance, and a chance to hear both queens (Beatrix and Betty) lay out the plans of their respective governments.
     
    We watched the proceedings on telly, beginning with the royal entourage processing in a variey of horse-drawn carriages from Noordeinde Palace to the Binnenhof (the Dutch Parliament buildings), and then watching the Queen’s speech from the throne in the Ridderzaal (Knights’ Hall).
     
    What I really adore about living in the Netherlands is the way you get suckered into thinking that things are just the same as in the UK, but then something sneaks up on you and slaps your brain awake to make you realise that, no, they do things differently here. So there I was, watching the procession, with the gilded coach and the over-the-top liveries, and listening to the Dutch commentator droning on. And just as I was settling down to thinking how like the home-life of our own dear queen this was, I snapped awake as I suddenly realised that the commentator appeared to be giving medical histories of the Dutch Royal Family. Had she really just said that Pieter van Vollenhoven had been treated for cancer of the foreskin, and that while he would have regular checkups from now on, his doctors were confident that the treatment had been successful? Yes, I do believe that she had… Perhaps not so like the home life of our own dear queen, after all… 
  • Wilders Strikes Again

    Every country has its share of politicians who display signs of being either loons or would-be demagogues. Here in the Netherlands we have Geert Wilders, who yesterday called for a complete ban on the sale of the Qu’ran or its use in mosques. Well what’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, I say, if you’re going to ban the Qu’ran, then logically you should also ban the Bible, which is also not short of toe-curling passages and injunctions to kill the non-believer. But, of course, the publicity-hungry Mr. Wilders and his sympathisers can’t see that particular beam lodged firmly in their eyes. A more measured response came from Afshin Ellian, advisor to ex-Muslim Ehsan Jami, whose beating-up outside of his local supermarket apparently initiated this wild idea from Wilders. Ellian pointed out that instead of banning the book, firmer measures should be taken against the radical imams and mosques that use the Qu’ran to spread hatred.
  • Learning From The Masters

    The BBC has recently been going through some public washing of its dirty linen, after being shown to be falling short of the standards set by Lord Reith. Quite right too.
     
    But as Mark Ravenhill points out in today’s Guardian, the BBC has only been following in the footsteps of New Labour. It’s an excellent article and accurately skewers both organisations with the charge of stage management like beetles to a board.
  • Be Careful What You Wish For

    The news that Boris Johnson has thrown his hat into the ring in the contest for London’s mayor has me staring into the abyss. Yes, he’s a celebrity darling, but would you want him to be in charge of anything more consequential than a stuffed toy? Red Ken may have his shortcomings (a blindspot for islamic scholars for one), but he seems to me to be a stronger candidate than Johnson could ever be. Still, when did the human race ever prove that its collective IQ was more than that of a lemming? Stand by for the outcome foreseen here. I have at least the distance. Thank the lord.
  • With Friends Like These…

    …who needs enemies? I know I’m coming late to this story, but I’ve finally seen the video of Mika Brzezinski refusing to lead with the so-called "news" story of Scunthorpe Motel (aka Paris Hilton) being released from jail.
     
    While I knew that I would be siding with Ms. Brzezinski, until I saw the video I hadn’t quite appreciated just how sickened I would feel by the behaviour of her co-presenters. What a pair of absolute wankers.
     
     
  • The Great Wen

    Craig Murray comments on recent events in London, and opens with a marvellous evocation of the Great Wen that is worthy of Michael Moorcock’s Mother London:
    LONDON
    An Italian banker, custodian of Vatican money and secrets, is found swinging under Blackfriars Bridge. Businessmen purchase seats in the national legislature simply for payments of cash. A Bulgarian dissident is killed with a tiny ricin pellet injected from an umbrella. A Brazilian electrician is executed by police on the London underground. The dismembered torso of a small African child floats down the Thames. The country’s most flamboyant businessman, a lawmaker, steals his workers’ pensions and leaves for a yacht cruise. Muslim lads from Yorkshire kill themselves and 67 people on public transport. Etonian mercenaries plan coups in Papua New Guinea, Sierra Leone and Equatorial Guinea before finding respectability and the jackpot in Iraq. A Russian defector is poisoned with polonium and dies a slow horrible death. Politicians and civil servants concoct a dossier of lies to provoke a war. A girl is arrested for reading out the names of the dead at the Cenotaph, and a man for carrying Vanity Fair outside Downing St. A small black child bleeds to death in a tenement stairwell. Gays die as a nail bomb rips through a pub. The IRA run a long, slow war of death and attrition. Every year, scores of people simply disappear. Homeless people curl up like bundles in neon-lit doorways.  
    Go and read the rest.
  • Dominoes

    I had some respect for Wim Kok. But when I read this sort of thing, then I think I was mistaken.
    RNW: So the mistakes he made in relation to Iraq resulted from a strong belief that he was choosing the right way?
     
    "Absolutely. If you still remember his speech, his brilliant speech, in the British parliament on the eve before the British took action in Iraq, then you’ll remember that this was really a man who believed in every word he spoke with so much passion and conviction. I was very impressed by that. Although I had a somewhat different view, I was still impressed by what he did."
    Oh bloody hell. Why don’t people realise that passion and conviction does not make things true? Evidence makes things true. Kok, you’ve gone down in my estimation.   
  • Open The Can…

    … and what you might find inside are worms.
     
    There’s recently been a story in the UK press about a 16 year-old who has gone to the High Court to accuse her school of discriminating against Christians by banning the wearing of "purity rings". Now it starts to appear as though the backstory to this is even more interesting. See here and here. Whether this gets picked up in the mainstream media, of course, is another matter.
     
    Oh, and be sure to check out the greatest animated cartoon ever made. See the second link.
  • Goodbye, Tony

    The farewell can’t come soon enough for some people. Can’t say I blame them. Beware of Godwin’s law, though.
       
  • Sloppy Journalism

    Oh dear, I’m sure there was a time when the BBC was considered a gold standard in journalism. But as Ophelia points out, they seem increasingly to be employing Unspeak in their reporting, whether consciously or not. Compare this opening from the Beeb’s news site yesterday:
    Iran has criticised the British government for its decision to give a knighthood to author Salman Rushdie. His book The Satanic Verses offended Muslims worldwide and led to Iran issuing a fatwa in 1989, ordering Sir Salman’s execution. 
    with this one from The Guardian:
    Iran accused Britain yesterday of insulting Islam by awarding a knighthood to Salman Rushdie, whose novel The Satanic Verses prompted the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to issue a fatwa calling for his assassination. 
    If you can’t see the difference, refer to Ophelia’s excellent analysis. She nails the bastards.
  • A Masterstroke

    The Guardian reports on a stunning idea by the US Military. What can possibly go wrong?
  • How Not To Answer Your Critics

    Well, of course, looking at American politics is like shooting fish in a barrel. But when you have presidential candidate Senator Sam Brownback coming out with this guff, then I’m sorry, but I fear for the state of that particular nation.
    While no stone should be left unturned in seeking to discover the nature of man’s origins, we can say with conviction that we know with certainty at least part of the outcome. Man was not an accident and reflects an image and likeness unique in the created order. Those aspects of evolutionary theory compatible with this truth are a welcome addition to human knowledge. Aspects of these theories that undermine this truth, however, should be firmly rejected as an atheistic theology posing as science.
    So that would be, "I’m sorry; I’ve made my mind up, and no amount of evidence is going to dissuade me from my crazed view of reality".
     
    Welcome to Kansas. 
  • Bye Bye…

    Hilzoy, over at Obsidian Wings, writes what is probably the perfect summing-up of the Paul Wolfowitz debacle at the World Bank.
  • You Cannot Be Serious II…

    Belatedly, I discover it’s not just the UN that appears to be taking leave of its senses. The Council of Europe is just as guilty. Jobs for the boys, and to hell with the people, eh?
  • You Cannot Be Serious…

    …is this really going to be the candidate country to head the UN’s Commission for Sustainable Development? Has the UN been taken over by Monty Python? Bizarre in the extreme.