Non credo quia absurdum est - by Richard... Sunday, September 25, 2011

Non credo quia absurdum est - by Richard... Sunday, September 25, 2011

In April 2010, they were saying Greek default was not going to happen. It took just over the year for Greece to lie on its economic deathbed, the death rattle in its throat. And now, the "colleagues" agree that default is inevitable.

Yet they are going to ring fence the collapse and prevent the spread of contagion. And the reason we should believe them is
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Freedom of speech? - by Richard...

No doubt, The Sunday Telegraph will claim to support the principles of freedom of speech and expression. But not, it seems, when it comes to Booker describing the actions of his colleague and Bradford MDC. If you look at the story as originally prepared for the press, and the copy as it went to the website, which is also how it was printed. You will find some curious omissions. No mention of North, and none of Bradford.

Once again, one has to observe, buying a newspaper is now simply an expensive way of being misinformed. And if they are leaving out details such as this, what else are they leaving out?

The issue here, however, is especially interesting. Google "bailiffs" in the news section and you may be surprised how few stories there are about bailiff malpractice - and none about their criminality. It is not only the police who are turning a blind eye, but the MSM as well. Our local paper has run a mile from the story, and other papers have ditched other aspects of it.

A while ago, this would have been serious - but no longer, now we have the blogs. And yes, I know that our coverage does not begin to match the MSM - but neither did the samizdat leaflets in Soviet Russia. Collectively, though, we do reach the people who matter. The MSM is cutting its own throat.

The guilty men - by Richard...

There are very few occasions when I disagree with Dellers, but his eulogy of Peter Oborne and Frances Weaver and their "Guilty Men" pamphlet is one such occasion. We then have this ghastly pair in The Spectator grandly declaring:

Very rarely in political history has any faction or movement enjoyed such a complete and crushing victory as the Conservative Eurosceptics. The field is theirs. They were not merely right about the single currency, the greatest economic issue of our age — they were right for the right reasons. They foresaw with lucid, prophetic accuracy exactly how and why the euro would bring with it financial devastation and social collapse.

This is typical "above the line" crap, but it is more than that … it is practically a blood libel. The victory, such as it is, goes to Jimmy Goldsmith and his Referendum Party, and the thousands of candidates and workers who boxed first Hague and then Blair into a corner, getting a commitment to a referendum before the UK could join the euro.

As always, while the Tories sat around their hands in their pockets, the mavericks made the running. The Tories simply went along for the ride. And if you want "guilty men" look to the likes ofThe Scotsman on 5 October 2004. Then, James Kirkup and Fraser Nelson were writing about Michael Howard and his "best efforts to bury the Tories' divisive obsession with all things European".

John Redwood, they said, appeared determined to make opposition to the European Union the party's first priority. "Above all, we’re going to win by telling people the truth about Brussels and the EU - no to the European constitution, no to giving up the pound", he was saying.

Cut then to David Cameron, who was at the time about to oversee the writing of the Tory manifesto. He delivered a direct rebuke to the former Welsh secretary. "We don't win by picking one single issue, whether it's Europe or anything else, and talking about it incessantly", said The Boy, described then as "a rising star, tipped by some as a future Tory leader".

Said Cameron back then in 2004, "If you don't sound balanced, you won't seem balanced." Thus did he say that the Tories had to focus on "schools, hospitals, crime - the things people talk about in the pubs and clubs. We mustn't go off into wild forays into different areas".

From there we saw the Tory dictum, "don't mention Europe". All the good little Tories, Redwood included, rolled over and obeyed. The EU disappeared from the agenda. They are the guilty men, the men who said nothing while others fought the battle. At least the europhiles had the courage of their convictions. The Tory eurosceptics had neither courage nor convictions.

Now it has become fashionable to be "eurosceptic" and they are all creeping out of the woodwork, with the court jester Oborne singing their praises. So no, this is not a Tory eurosceptic victory – but like Tories everywhere, they'd steal the clothes off your back if it gave them a headline. They are stealing a "victory" won by others.