The Sun Shines Only Half The Day, But You, Comrade Alan (not the Minister) Shine All Night Too

Dave is away in India (oh please tell me he is there to write something about intolerance between Hindus and Muslims, not to launch a "World Is Flat" article about globalisation). So I'm left with nothing to Watch except cheap shots at the Euston Manifesto crowd (haven't we given up on this yet? nope. does this mean we think it's really really important? In the somewhat limited sphere of anti-war British blogs, yes).

Some of the AW crowd had been thinking of writing a piece comparing the EM crowd to some of the more hilarious encomia written to Lenin and Stalin while they were alive ("Comrade Norm was cheered to the echo as he outlined the triumph of the Five Year Plan" etc). However there is no need, when you have stuff like this, from "Fisking Central".

We weren’t won over by the gravitas, dignity and integrity of Norman Geras, hugely impressive as his speech was. We weren’t won over by the erudition and knowledge of Shalom Lappin. We weren’t even won over by the enthusiasm and considerable intelligence of Eve Garrard.

We were won over by the passion, determination and ambition of Alan Johnson. (not the minister - bruschettaboy)

Johnson was different. He spoke of practicalities and applications – his optimism, appealing as it was, was more than matched by a sense of personal proportion, realism and pragmatism. The idealism of the other speakers was transformed into relevant, achievable goals; supporting international trade unionism and other NGOs, for example, lobbying British parliamentarians, translating the manifesto for a wider audience, and so on. In providing this, Johnson turned what was essentially a talking shop into something that may have political value. It became clear how one could personally contribute. In presenting the Euston politics as an art of the possible (to paraphrase badly), a flush of excitement was created.

Emphasis in original. Sorry guys but if you are going to call yourselves "Fisking Central" and build your site around being the kings of logical hard-edged analysis, then a piece of breathless nut-riding like this is bound to pick up some comment.

If there are any other members of A"NTM"J's personality cult out there maybe you could do a guest editorial for us; the email address is to the left.

In related news, as a correspondent points out:

[...]where the Euston train's headed nobody knows, but there's talk of getting Paul Berman involved in June and a meeting planned on Darfur for September (details to follow).

I can hear the aid workers in Darfur now; "hold on lads! hang in there! only three and a bit more months and the Euston Manifesto Group will have worked out a position!".