Extreme varieties of nothinginparticularism

Edwin Greenwood notes that, whilst British media types have complied meekly with Indian officialdom's belated two-fingered gesture towards the Raj of turning Bombay into Mumbai, the locals are less enthusiastic.

I feel sure that they are also less reticent than the BBC about naming the cause which has claimed a further 18 lives in the city. I was originally going to link the previous sentence to this item. But now, on reading the Beeb's account of the latest Bombay bloodbath, I find that it makes my point just as well. Just as the estimable young Jordanian is tackling "extremism" with his computer games, so we have speculation as to whether the blasts were the work of "home-grown militant outfits like the Indian Mujahideen (IM)", or, as in 2008, of "Pakistani-based militants".

Extremism has to be an extreme form of something. You can't be a militant without something to be militant about. Pardon me for repeating myself, but it's one thing (and bad enough) for government to adopt this mealy-mouthedness as a matter of policy; for the organization we pay willy-nilly to bring us the news to follow suit is unconscionable.

Understatement of the month

From the findings of the investigation into the American Catholic TV presenter Fr John Corapi by his religious order:-

“Holds legal title to over $1 million in real estate, numerous luxury vehicles, motorcycles, an ATV, a boat dock and several motor boats, which is a serious violation of his promise of poverty as a perpetually professed member of this society.”

101 Uses for Other People's Money

No. 53: set up a website that nobody ever visits.

Headline of the week

Virgin warns infected customers

And courts risk of being sued under the Trades Descriptions Act?

Sorry, couldn't resist it.

Raising awareness of the stakeholders in the room

John Rentoul reaches out to us to share his concerns and issues around clichés. What's not to like? Though I do hope I won't be named and shamed. And I fear Mr Rentoul himself may be teetering on the edge with his opening "I have an article". Pots, kettles.

I must admit I haven't yet come across "toilet" as a verb. Is it transitive or intransitive?

(Hat tip - is that on the list, or already old hat? - to Fr Tim)

Have I got this right?

'This is not helped by a quiet resurgence of the seductive language of "deserving" and "undeserving" poor, nor by the steady pressure to increase what look like punitive responses to alleged abuses of the system.'

- Ed Miliband

'those at the top and the bottom who were not showing responsibility and were shirking their duty to each other [...] some of those on benefits who were abusing the system because they could work - but didn't.

'Labour - a party founded by hard-working people for hard-working people - was seen by some, however unfairly, as the party of those ripping off our society.'

- The Archbshop of Canterbury

No, wait...

Schadenfreuderealpolitikbeansproutthing

Warning: this post contains tasteless schadenfreude*.

OK, I know the new E. coli outbreak is no laughing matter. But you would need a heart of stone not to crease up at the news that, after initially fingering organic cucumbers, the German authorities are now closing in on an organic bean sprout farm. Yes, this is an epidemic tailor made for culling health food junkies. I mean, what normal human being, on being told that their next meal is going to be their last one, would order bean sprouts?

And, as one who has himself patronised German health food shops in his time (Frau G made me do it), I strongly suspect, despite the Beeb's reservations, that we already have the solution to the mystery of the sexist bug.

The German government should urgently consider launching a health campaign aimed at middle-class women in their thirties, to encourage them to switch to healthier options such as beer and sausages.

*Foootnote: since like so many bloggers I dream of breaking into the big time in the manner of Oliver Kamm, I follow the rules of the hack's profession and take care to use this word, or its synonym realpolitik, when writing anything about Germany. For the benefit of those who didn't get an edukayshun, it means "I am cultured and cosmopolitan, a veritable Renaissance man". On the other hand, I am emphatically not going to mention the Nazis. Oh, bother, I just did.

Londoners, don't vote for Ken! (reason no. 953)

Very much a last minute job, this. Blame moving house, changing my religion etc. Plus I really thought that someone in the MSM would have a long enough memory to pick up on this one. In fact someone had done, only three years ago and thus before Colonel Gaddafi declared war on the Libyan people. It's a much. much more pertinent story today, so here it is for the record.

Once upon a time there was an exceptionally repellent totalitarian sect called the Workers Revolutionary Party. Being not only exceptionally repellent but also unusually well-funded, it was able to put out a daily paper, the Newsline. Party members were expected to devote 25 hours a day to selling this product. On a good day they would come across somebody prepared to part with money for it.

In the early Eighties it evidently dawned on the WRP that the Newsline was not reaching the masses, so they decided to try to broaden their influence by launching a "Labour" paper. And so the Labour Herald was born, a classic front organization. As well as having "Labour" in its name, it was to be fronted by a Labour editor - and no less a figure than the Leader of the Greater London Council was waiting in the wings.

Here's a sample of the paper's content. Anti-Semitic? I'm sure Ken would no more think so now than he did then.

And now I'll let Keith Dovkants of the Eve Stennit tell the rest of the story:-

'The paper was printed by a firm based in Runcorn, Cheshire, which also printed News Line and publications sponsored by the Libyan government.

'When Private Eye ran a piece claiming Ken Livingstone, then leader of the GLC, was editing a paper financed by the Libyans he successfully sued for libel. It has to be remembered that at that time Gaddafi was encouraging the assassination of his political opponents abroad and wiping them out at home. In 1984 his thugs fired on demonstrators outside the Libyan embassy in St James's Square, killing WPC Yvonne Fletcher.

'Although no one doubts Gaddafi was subsidising News Line and Labour Herald there is absolutely no evidence Ken knew about it. But he did support the WRP when it published an extraordinary anti-Jewish rant in News Line.

'On 20 March 1983, BBC2 ran an investigation on its Money Programme. Its central thesis was that the WRP's newspaper, Ken's Labour Herald and other publications were being funded by Gaddafi. Looking at the transcript today one sees a thorough, rather measured, piece of journalism. The response was quite different.

'Under the heading The Zionist Connection, News Line published an editorial denouncing the Money Programme's investigation. It blamed a "powerful Zionist connection" that ran through the Labour Left, Mrs Thatcher's government, to the BBC. It cited the placing of Stuart Young, a director of the Jewish Chronicle, as chairman of the corporation and the appointment of his brother, David Young, to head the Manpower Services Commission. The Jewish Chronicle, the editorial noted, gave "support and advance publicity" to the Money Programme.

'On the day of its hysterical editorial News Line ran a piece in which Ken suggested the Money Programme report was indeed the work of Zionists. In the same piece he blamed "smears" against him on agents working for Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin's government.'

So when confronted with the facts Ken preferred to endorse the WRP's theory that the Money Programme was in the grip of a Zionist conspiracy (we all know how much Zionists like their money, don't we?) rather than acknowledge that he had unwittingly taken a bloodstained tyrant's money.

Has Ken ever retracted this position? His Wikipedia entry passes over this strand of his career in silence. It wouldn't be the only case where "Sorry" has been the hardest word for him. Employing Lee Jasper still isn't a cause for regret, it seems. Sorry, but Ken's not fit to be Mayor.

Christians rejoice?

I was going to start this post by observing that I do not expect to read a more inane reaction to the killing of Osama bin Laden than Cristina Odone's attempt to construct a (im-)moral equivalence between Americans celebrating the demise of the bearded one and the "Arab street" rejoicing over 9/11. That, however, was before Rowan Williams's PR man George Pitcher popped up singing from the same hymnbook*. My cup runneth over, and I think it is Mr Pitcher who must be awarded the palm, if only for his inspired use of the term "rednecks".

Well, George Pitcher is in the deepest and truest sense not my problem any more. As for Cristina Odone, however, I am emboldened to suggest that after less than a fortnight as a Catholic I already have a better grasp of Catholic moral theology than she has.

It is right to celebrate the success of a just endeavour and wrong to celebrate the success of an unjust endeavour. As simple as that. And when I say "right" I don't mean just "permissible". We ought to be thankful that Osama has been put out of the way of masterminding the taking of innocent lives, thankful to those whose professionalism, doggedness and courage has brought about this end. Why, Ms Odone, should anyone risk their neck for the sake of your freedom if the most you can manage when they triumph is a "yes, Osama bin Laden’s death is a good thing" from between gritted teeth?

But surely, you may now be saying, our Cristina has the Vatican on her side? Thus Fr Federico Lombardi:-

“Osama bin Laden – as we all know – was gravely responsible for promoting division and hatred between peoples, causing the end of countless innocent lives, and of exploiting religions to this end.

“Faced with the death of a man, a Christian never rejoices, but reflects on the serious responsibility of each and every one of us before God and before man, and hopes and commits himself so that no event be an opportunity for further growth of hatred, but for peace.”

And quite right, too. Note, for one thing, the first of these two sentences, and see if you can find its equivalent in either GP's or CO's posts; compare the forthright attribution of guilt with George Pitcher's portrayal of Osama as a man denied a fair trial. Note also the absence of direct condemnation of anyone other than Osama himself, and again compare and contrast. Note next that the Vatican can never forget the exigencies of diplomacy when it chooses its words. Fr Lombardi will have been keenly aware that there are Christians in Pakistan.

And note above all a crucial distinction. It is the termination of the man's evil deeds which is just cause for rejoicing, not the termination of his life. However just, the fighting of a war is a poor substitute for the repentance of the aggressor. That's a distinction which, I dare say, many patriotic Americans are failing to draw today, but the faux pacifist liberals sitting in judgment over them in North London aren't doing any better. Two sides of the same coin, in fact.

*That will, of course, be the one from which which the inappropriately militaristic "Onward Christian soldiers" has been expunged in favour of "Onward Christian pilgrims".

Men are a waste of space, and the BBC has the stats to prove it

Two BBC stories from the same day, unconnected but offering an instructive contrast.

From the first:- 'Almost 100 women are killed by partners or ex-partners each year, figures show. 'And 21 men died from domestic abuse in England and Wales last year.'

Now, though the mention of male victims may strike you as something of an afterthought, I say the author deserves considerable credit for thinking of them at all. There's a lot of ideological capital invested in the perception of domestic violence as Exhibit A in the case against the patriarchy, and far too much media coverage has endorsed this view by presenting it without qualification as a male-on-female crime.

So three cheers for a Beeb reporter who has acknowledged that more than one case in six adds up to too many exceptions to the rule to be brushed under the carpet. Nevertheless the rule does get stated. The gender/sex breakdown is there to remind us, just in case we had any doubt, that most victims are female and most perpetrators male.

Now compare what we find in another story from the same day:-

'Since operations began in Afghanistan in 2001, 363 UK servicemen and women have died.'

The double plural actually makes this sentence misleading. For, as is revealed by following a couple of links, the gender/sex breakdown here is in fact 362 to 1. To make the comparison crystal clear, if we surveyed 363 domestic abuse fatalities we would expect to find over 60 male victims.

So a breakdown is de rigueur when it suggests that murdering your partner is very much a man thing, but to be avoided where it might give the impression that getting killed for your country is even more of a man thing. I'm sure there's no deliberate indoctrination going on here. That happened a long way up the line. At this point it's just the working out of an unconscious worldview, the fruits of the coming true of Gramsci's dream of cultural hegemony. I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that both pieces were written by men.

No definitive evidence for a correlation between gender and nitpicking blogging was available at the time of going to press.