The Green Ribbon
I will be adding The Green Ribbon, Tom Griffin's site, to our blogroll as soon as I get round to it. It's really worth a regular read - Tom is a proper journalist with a background in Northern Irish coverage, and it is really quite surprising how many Men Of Decency and various flavours of "Atlanticist"[1] turn out to have intelligence connections of one sort or another. He has a good postat the moment about the "Get Ken" movement, which I am hereby bumping from comments.
I am not sure what the official AW position is on Ken Livingstone, by the way. I don't wholly agree with Chardonnay Chap that he's unelectable - he is currently the bookie's favourite and his abilities as a machine politician shouldn't be underestimated, although at present he has the drag factor of Labour's unpopularity working against him (although the Curse of Kamm is working in his favour). I'd guess it's a toss-up. On the substantive issues (upon which wild horses could not drag me to vote), I rather agree with the Yorkshire Ranter that the technocratic ability of the Ken clique shouldn't be ruled as totally irrelevant (PS: vintage transport fans, fuck off - those bendy buses are much more efficient). I think that Ken is now the new occupant of my Israel analogy joke[2], taking over from the previous incumbent, George Galloway. For what it's worth, the "politicalbetting.com" tipster site are betting against Ken.
[1] by which I mean the real ones, not the wannabes.
[2] ie, that like the State of Israel, he is an intrinsically rather unlovable entity that becomes worthy of a kind of guarded and qualified support simply because of the calibre of creep that obsessively attacks him.
I am not sure what the official AW position is on Ken Livingstone, by the way. I don't wholly agree with Chardonnay Chap that he's unelectable - he is currently the bookie's favourite and his abilities as a machine politician shouldn't be underestimated, although at present he has the drag factor of Labour's unpopularity working against him (although the Curse of Kamm is working in his favour). I'd guess it's a toss-up. On the substantive issues (upon which wild horses could not drag me to vote), I rather agree with the Yorkshire Ranter that the technocratic ability of the Ken clique shouldn't be ruled as totally irrelevant (PS: vintage transport fans, fuck off - those bendy buses are much more efficient). I think that Ken is now the new occupant of my Israel analogy joke[2], taking over from the previous incumbent, George Galloway. For what it's worth, the "politicalbetting.com" tipster site are betting against Ken.
[1] by which I mean the real ones, not the wannabes.
[2] ie, that like the State of Israel, he is an intrinsically rather unlovable entity that becomes worthy of a kind of guarded and qualified support simply because of the calibre of creep that obsessively attacks him.
posted by The Rioja Kid at 1/21/2008 09:55:00 AM
15 Comments:
btw the CC in your post must refer to Chardonnay Chap, as Captain Cabernet, though not a fan of Ken, shares your judgement re electability.
One thing's for sure about tonight's Despatches, it won't be worse than Martin Bright's "Did Unity Mitford bear Hitler's lovechild" programme, because it simply couldn't be ... .
yes it does, I'll make that clearer because we are all about clarity ...
It's funny how the Tories, who have been in favour of getting rid of bus conductors for 35 years, now want to bring them back even though Oyster cards make them more or less redundant.
For the record, my late great-aunt, active in London Labour politics for half a century, was a colleague of Ken when he was first a Labour councillor. She said that she was the only visitor to her flat that her cats ever liked.
The other, less interesting thing she said about him is that he had a habit of going missing when there was a close and controversial vote coming up. This is probably a better key to understanding Ken than the ravings of paranoid Decents, though what is not?
Engaging with our ideas. Will the Decents be engaging with the issues raised in Jonathan Steele's series of articles in the Guardian (second section)? I find the first part a vey interesting read. Blair simply wasn't engaging with the issue of "what happens next?" after overthrowing Saddam and of how you might build a functioning, democratic state. He was determined to be part of Bush's invasion (despite what he was telling us) and the WMD issue was a smokescreen to obscure this. (Blair and his entourage also probably used the WMD issue as a psychological shield to protect themselves from thinking about post-invasion issues.)
Despite the reality of the results of the invasion of Iraq, Blairites and Decents still think that they have a right to invade a "country like Iraq" without UN resolutions etc. Have they yet engaged with the fact that the result of the invasion of Iraq wasn't just due to a forgetting a few details.
Guano
Will the Decents be engaging with the issues raised in Jonathan Steele's series of articles in the Guardian?
No, because that would be "picking over the rubble", which they are pledged not to do.
The opening paragraphs, though, are very very funny.
She said that she was the only visitor to her flat that her cats ever liked.
Now that is some recommendation.
"The opening paragraphs are vey very funny". Explain the joke to me please. Are you referring to the meeting between Blair, Joffe, Tripp and Dodge? I've met these people and they really know their stuff yet Blair basically blanked them. I find it deeply worrying that Blair was so shallow-minded (even more than I had thought) but there are still people like Kettle saying that he should be President of Europe.
Guano
Mind you, Lord Salisbury claimed "all dogs like me" according to Robert K. Massie's Dreadnought.
Further, Tom Griffin's blog is good, but he does actually care about the West Lothian question, which worries me.
it is really quite surprising how many Men Of Decency and various flavours of "Atlanticist"[1] turn out to have intelligence connections of one sort or another.
I was wondering how long it would take for someone else to notice this. There is a poster on Harry’s Place called Brett Lock who had been accused a year or so of working for an organisation, British Satellite News, which is funded by the FCO to produce propaganda and fake news.
See here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1709950,00.html
About a month ago something very interesting happened. Brett Lock posted an article at HP about IIRC the British Ahwazi Friendship and the persecution of the Ahwazi by the Mullahs. This post drew a furious response by in the comments box from a poster called Rostam Farrokhzād (who I am guessing from his other posts is a Iran monarchist- he’s certainly a strong opponent of the current Iranian regime & Islamism generally) who accused Lock of being a spook and was scathing of the Ahwazi Friendship Society who he accused of being a Neo-con front organisation designed to divide Iranians and ferment unrest.
Within five minutes of Rostam’s comment the entire thread was removed by the moderators. Looked pretty fishy to me…
As for the comment about Ken being unelectable . Do me a favour. Whatever you think of him that looks unlikely. The major 2 figures of the past 30 years of British political history, Blair and Thatcher, both did their best to destroy him and couldn’t. Can’t honestly see Martin Bright managing it.
The programme was fairly lightweight. A lot of recycled allegations, a few bits which looked dodgy but won't seriously hurt him electorally (none of them were as bad as his contacts with Sinn Fein in the 80s), and an extended section denouncing the congestion charge.
Hang on. Does that mean Brett Lock is the same person as "Daniel Brett" who has previously shown an interest in Iranian-Ahwazi affairs and hs also been accused of being a spook or having connections to them?
Seems more likely to me the commenter on Comment is Free got them confused.
I stand corrected ejh.
I meant Daniel Brett not Brett Lock. Sorry for any misunderstanding.
that like the State of Israel, he is an intrinsically rather unlovable entity that becomes worthy of a kind of guarded and qualified support simply because of the calibre of creep that obsessively attacks him.
I dunno, you could make the opposite point just as easily. The calibre of creep that obsessively defends, and polices criticism of, Israel are no better. Worse in some ways - Joan Peters, or Dershowitz, for example. And defenders of Israel are normally doing so from a position of power.
Incidentally the Israel joke made a very early appearance on this blog...
Post a Comment
<< Home