New Blog launched!
Marko Attila Hoare, familiar to AW comments section readers as "that angry bloke", has a new blog. Its slogan is "The Perfect is the Enemy of the Good" (which in the context of humanitarian interventions can presumably be extended to "The Sane is the Enemy of the Terrible"). At present he only has one post up, and it is on the familiar theme of a) us lot never criticising dictators and murderers, despite regularly having done so and b) his lot being very critical of George W Bush, despite having signed a manifesto saying that they wouldn't. It's not a theme that I agree with, and it's not exactly new material for the Decency debate. However, MAH does have other themes and the blog might be worth reading if he writes on them.
The temptation to make some sort of joke regarding his surname is at all times overpowering, but it just seems so cheap (and the pseudonymity of this blog would mean that he couldn't respond in kind), so I won't bother.
The temptation to make some sort of joke regarding his surname is at all times overpowering, but it just seems so cheap (and the pseudonymity of this blog would mean that he couldn't respond in kind), so I won't bother.
posted by The Rioja Kid at 11/08/2007 04:21:00 PM
24 Comments:
Thanks for the link.
For the record, though; while it is true that I was criticising leftists who support dictators and murderers, there was nothing in my post that could suggest I include Aaronovitch Watch in that category. There are plenty of 'non-Decent' left-wing blogs that don't support dictators and murderers - e.g. Crooked Timber, Dave's Part, Random Pottins. I have no reason to assume that AW is not among them.
I'm sorry that you construe my critique of leftists who support dictators and murderers as an attack on 'us lot'. If you don't support dictators and murderers, then the post wasn't criticising you.
Attila is a comrade of Martin Spegelj, the former Croatian Minister of Defence.
Spegelj was caught on tape before war broke out
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%A0pegelj_Tapes
plotting to carry out acts of murder and treason. He planned to kill loyal members of the JNA in the same way that Pinochet killed soldiers loyal to Allende.
Attilla has gone on to co-write books with Spegelj.
Is "support dictators and murderers" going to be some kind of chorus line? And is it I wonder going to include only people who actively say they support such people, or are we going to be in the regions of the implicit?
Oh for Christ's sake.
Can we settle once and for all who, precisely, it is that's supporting dictators and murderers?
Trying to pin down Decent opinion on this is like trying to nail jelly to a buttered dolphin - it seems to mean different things to different people at different times.
So far as I can see, the meaning of Supporting dictators and murderers lies somewhere between "opposing the Iraq war", "believing American troops should vacate Iraq" and "sleeping under a Saddam-print duvet while praying for the destruction of Britain."
Fear not, Rodent, I am sure tomorrow we will be in for the production of some juicy quotes, to enliven our otherwise dull and dismal Fridays.
In the meantime I am gratified to notice that my word verifcation is komnob, which sounds like a parody of a Stalinist sexual health programme.
My guess is that "anonymous" is the same person as occasional HP Sauce commenter "resistor" who may (or may not) be Neil Clark or some affiliated person. Anyway, anonymous, please fuck off.
'My guess is that "anonymous" is the same person as occasional HP Sauce commenter "resistor" who may (or may not) be Neil Clark or some affiliated person. Anyway, anonymous, please fuck off.'
I see, for exposing Attila Hoare as a collaborator with one of the destroyers of Yugoslavia, my reward is infantile abuse. Did I touch a nerve?
if you are Neil Clark, the answer is "fuck yeah". Frankly, being a "loyal member of the JNA" at the time in question was functionally equivalent to being "an ordinary member of the Wehrmacht, not the SS"; "I wasn't one of those crazy bastards, oh no not me! I just took care of their logistics/fired the prep bombardment into Vukovar for them/flew the cash in from Cyprus..."
PS, if you remember, you accused me of being both a Nazi and a paedophile until I barred your IP address.
Frankly, being a "loyal member of the JNA" at the time in question was functionally equivalent to being "an ordinary member of the Wehrmacht, not the SS";
No it wasn't, and I would have thought the comparison is unhelpful (if only because it transgresses Godwin's Law). But to me the real point is that if people are going to say serious things about individuals, on other people's blogs, you should append a recognisable identity to your posting. Whoever your target is. If you absolutely can't do it, for one reason or another, then pass the information to somebody who can. But as it stands, it's really not on. You either make accusations in public or you don't make them at all.
I am perfectly ready to delete "Anonymous"'s comments and will do like a shot if anyone can persuade me that they are libellous or otherwise offensive. As it stands, however, after about five minutes of research, I haven't come up with any evidence of Martin Spegelj having been indicted for war crimes or even credibly accused of them other than by people who were transparently trying to save their own skin. I am therefore not convinced that there is anything bad about having been mates with Martin Spegelj and don't want the AW deletion policy to accidentally create the impression that it is. I am also not terribly impressed with the phrase "the destroyers of Yugoslavia", as in my experience it has a high degree of correlation with nutterism.
"Trying to pin down Decent opinion on this is like trying to nail jelly to a buttered dolphin"
Typical of the Left, when not supporting dictators and murderers the promote food waste and animal abuse!
Marko Attila Hoare is pretty much a classic Decent, not on the edges like Tatchell or Hari.
In common with other members of the Decent species in their natural habitat (Harry's Place), Marko can be relied upon to spit moral condemnations, and unctuous turns of phrase - especially when gently mocked or during ritual denunciations of the usual suspects.
Oh, and apparently Marko shops at Zara, according to the photo on his blog.
Is "shops at Zara" a code word for something?
Look guys, as the founder of Aaronovitch Watch I realise I am not in a particularly good place to be complaining about personal vendettas but the title of the post is "New Blog launched!" not "This Way For The Three Minute Hate". I've thought that MAH was a bit aggressive in our comments sections and said so in demotic Anglo Saxon terms. But if he's launched a blog then he deserves to have it judged on what he writes there, same as the rest of us. Can we tone down the personal insults please?
for instance, he has written a great big steaming turd of a post right now (in which he classifies moderate social democrat Michael Moore as one of "our enemies" and Noam Chomsky as a "totalitarian"!), which I will write something about shortly.
Perhaps Marko has been reading Bernard Henri-Levy. According to the main article in the most recent Le Monde Diplomatique, this is the kind of thing BHL has been saying about Chomsky and BHL has become a bit of a guru for the PSF. Mon Dieu!
MAH isn't allowing comments on his 'blog', so we'll have to talk about it here.
MAH: "You cannot oppose the genocide in Sudan, or the Islamists in Iraq, if you oppose ‘Western intervention’; "
I can't help but notice there there are rather more Islamists in Iraq now than there were five years ago. And thanks to Western intervention, they are running the place.
Chris Williams
"Western intervention" appears to be seen in some quarters as a kind of "deus ex machina" that gets lowered onto the stage to magically resolve the dilemmas that nobody else could resolve. The problem is that the West is an actor in its own right, with its own agenda and its own limited knowledge and its own limited capacity.
Is he worth worrying about? I mean:
"... you cannot support women’s rights in the Middle East if you ally with Muslim fundamentalists on an ’anti-imperialist’ basis ..."
This kind of absolutism is ridiculous, and easily exposed by applying the same logic to the US and UK governments, who he is supporting.
What value is there in analysing the state of the left based on a discussion between Geras, Cohen and some "hard-line conservatives"?
I am not sure what "ally with Muslim fundamentalists on an ’anti-imperialist’ basis " means. I suspect that in attack it means "support human rights for the Palestinians or oppose the bombing of Iran", whereas in defence it means "invite Yusuf al-Qaradawi to a conference". Remember that words often have very, very different meanings depending on whether Norman Geras is attacking someone else, or being called on it.
he classifies moderate social democrat Michael Moore as one of "our enemies" and Noam Chomsky as a "totalitarian"
It'd be serious if it wasn't so funny.
Is "sir, you're mad" a reasonably polite response?
The article about Bernard Henri-Levy is only in the snail-eating surrender-monkey French edition of Le Monde Diplomatique, and doesn't make it to the English language edition. The English language edition only has such cheery stories as
- Somalia stands on the brink of total collapse
- towards fresh disaster in Iran
- Britain's mission in Iraq ends in complete failure
- is Yemen heading for another split?
- poor prospects for peace at the Annapolis conference
But anyway there is a certain similarity between what it is reported that BHL says and his targets and what Hoare is doing. Why such an extreme reaction to Chomsky, Moore etc. Are their conclusions that unsettling?
At least Michael Moore is 1) genuinely funny (and you don't have to agree with everything he says to recognise his abilities there), and 2) tries to stimulate a well needed debate on the US health care system (and again, you don't have to agree with all he says about health care, to recognise the value in that, and the good intentions in that). So I'm simply not buying the notion that Michael Moore is an enemy.
The irony, as Bruschettaboy notes, is that Moore is not actually particularly radical, he just appears that way, due to the lopsided US political system.
why do you tell neil clark to fuck off yet tiptoe around the likes of david t?
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