The Obscurer

Thursday 3rd February 2005

Diplomad For It!

Things are just about getting back to normal around here, following a huge surge in visitor numbers to this blog. The reason for the increased hit count was my mention of The Diplomad a week or so ago, the day before The Diplomad itself informed its readership about doing a Technorati search, resulting in their fans doing just that, and so finding their way here. I don’t think any have subsequently returned (I probably battered them with the power of my argument) so I am now back to my usual handful of readers, along with the odd (and I mean odd) visit due to peculiar Google searches (Latest search; “Adolf Hitler was an Evertonian”; the mind boggles). Anyway, I expect another spike of interest in my blog with this post, but then I hope that will be it. I have no intention of returning to this subject; as it is (two posts in a fortnight) I probably seem obsessed.

It was this article in Mediawatch that re-ignited my interest in The Diplomad. Writing about Job-Bloggers in general (and for one of the best, check out Call Centre Confidential; a brilliant, almost novelistic blog), they made the interesting comment that some of the people currently writing blogs are the sort of people who have always been used by the mainstream media when they want an anonymous insiders view on a matter; they write that “these are, of course, the very kinds of people traditionally treasured by journalists as sources. It’s just that now, they’ve gone freelance.”

They go on

“But what they say is only news if it’s accurate, relevant and interesting. The principles for trying to assess the merit of an insider blog aren’t much different from those any journalist uses to weigh up a source. Does it check out with other sources? What kind of agenda does the blogger have? And, most importantly, what is his or her track record?

“Recently, Diplomad, the anonymous blog written by US foreign service officers, made incendiary claims about United Nations arrogance and incompetence in the wake of the tsunami. These were trumpeted by many bloggers but largely ignored by the mainstream
media.

“Not because the Diplomad authors were not who they said they were. But because much of what they said didn’t tally with more conventional reports. Their reporting from the airstrip at Aceh – which at one point praised the efforts of New Zealand’s Hercules crews – seemed sound enough. But their pronouncements about what was happening in Jakarta, let alone the wider region, lacked any ring of authority.

“Diplomad proved to be a feisty source of opinion, as it hurled abuse at the UN, Human Rights Watch, the mainstream media and the UN again. But a reliable news source? Forget it.”

I can imagine fans of The Diplomad dismissing this as typical of the liberal utterings of the mainstream media who have been ignoring the truth according to The Diplomad; but I find it interesting to see one of the reasons why The Diplomad has been ignored, outside of some opinion-based columns.

So, “What kind of agenda does the blogger have?” In this regard, Diplomad is very co-operative; they have even drawn up their own Top Ten list, not so much of what they believe in, but of opinions they disagree with; ideas that a Mixed Economy could work, that the UN is a good idea, that Global Warming is a concern, or that Lee Harvey Oswald may not have acted alone (What? Nothing about the moon landings? Or Lady Di? I could swear I saw Elvis the other day)! For The Diplomad, however these ten ideas are not honestly held opinions they disagree with; they believe they are in fact lies, and presumably the people who hold these opinions are liars. Not that slagging people off and bandying the term liar around will bother the Diplomad; they already happily characterise their opponents as “vultures” and “leftoids”, and presumably in a stab at humour once referred to developing countries as being in the Turd World. Nice.

This all goes down very well with the Diplomad’s readers, many of whom leave comments urging the authors to “keep it up”, “don’t stop telling the truth”, and so on; and of course they are correct. The Diplomad obviously has a large fan base and speaks it’s mind, and long may it continue. You won’t get any argument from me about free speech, although I guess a civil court may have something to say about their freedom to call Edward Kennedy a “killer“.

And although they may hand out the insults, they can certainly take them; they write that “leftoblogs” have called them “liars,” “fantasists,” and — our favorite — LUNATICS. Great stuff! Keep it up.”

Really? Is this what The Diplomad is for; for the authors to vent their collective spleens, to play to the gallery, and to inspire “hissy fits” in their opponents? Wouldn’t they prefer to read lefties’ blog saying that “after reading The Diplomad, I have become more critical of the UN”, or “I am now reconsidering my belief in Global Warming”?

Will that happen? I would say it is unlikely. For as long as The Diplomad seems bereft of even a hint of objectivity, unless their criticisms become more measured and reasoned, while their whole tone often appears to be on the verge of a rant, then they are all too easy to dismiss. (Even when you agree with them. I am with them when they argue against the EU’s suggestion that Nazi symbols should be banned; but when they smirk that the call for a ban was made by “a man named FRANCO…seconded by a man with the word “scam” in his name, Roscam” and “to make matters even more absurd, we have some GERMANS lecturing the world about the “consequences and World War II history linked to the Nazi swastika” I think I will look elsewhere for my Allies on this one).

This is a shame; Diplomad talks about important issues, and the authors obviously hold positions in the US State Department which must impart great insider knowledge; even if, based on their own description of The Diplomad (A Blog by career US Foreign Service officers. They are Republican, most of the time, in an institution, State Department, in which being a Republican can be bad for your career) their’s appears to be a minority view. If and when the UN fails, for example, then I want to hear about it. As things stand though, while the Diplomad reads as a collection of biased, almost paranoid grumblings about a UN/EU/MSM conspiracy against the US, I think they will always just be preaching to the converted; and what is the point of that?

Update 5/2/05: The Diplomad calls it a day! Coincidence?

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Thursday 27th January 2005

Let 'Em In!

Because I am essentially kind of heart, I wouldn’t go as far as accusing Michael Howard of playing the race card in announcing the Conservatives’ new policy on asylum and immigration the other day; however, unless he can expand on his comments that millions of foreigners want to get into the UK, I think it is fair to accuse him of playing the “ignorant, irrational fear of immigration” card, which is a very similar thing.

Nowadays, it does seem as if people can give vent to their xenophobia by dressing it up as a legitimate concern over immigration policy. This week, “The Politics Show” went out and did a (notoriously unscientific) vox pop regarding peoples’ views on immigration. The majority (including all the first generation Britons polled) came up with the usual “enough is enough”, “we’re full up”, “I’m not racist but…” arguments. I love the idea that the country is literally full up. Where do these people actually live? Do they spend their entire life queuing shoulder to shoulder for a drink in Wetherspoons? Seeing as the population of the world is supposed to be able to fit on the Isle of Wight, I think we can squeeze a few more people into these islands for a while yet. Perhaps this idea had some currency when we had high levels of unemployment; but today?

Now, let me be clear; I am not arguing against any immigration policy at all. I have no truck with economic migrants posing as asylum seekers, not least because it is unfair on genuine economic migrants who are going through the legitimate channels. As for other legal immigrants, I think is sensible to restrict entrance to people who we believe will benefit our society; it seems crazy to do otherwise. But with these points in mind, what on earth is wrong with people being economic migrants? Why shouldn’t we welcome people who want to live and work in this country? My Mother was an economic migrant from Scotland to England some years ago; if she were from Slovenia, say, would there really be any difference in essence? Some people seem to work from the starting point that economic migration is bad in itself, but may occasionally be a necessary evil to fill certain jobs; but why? Unless you are racist, what argument is there against immigration per se? Why not err on the side that there is nothing wrong with one person moving from one country to another in the understandable desire to improve their life, and that the onus should be on proving that the would be immigrant will not contribute to, or would have a negative effect on, their new nation?

Two arguments which people often use against immigration are that a) immigrants only come here to claim benefit and don’t want to work, and b) immigrants come over here and take our jobs. No wonder such people are scared of these inscrutable foreigners; if they can take our jobs and not work, then you can understand the concern (a similar comment was made last week in Laurence Rees’s latest, timely programme Auschwitz; The Nazis and ‘The Final Solution’. A Slovak recalled how, during the War, everyone knew that the Jews in Slovakia didn’t want to work; he then laughed as he remembered helping to ship out the Jews and take over their businesses. So they owned businesses but didn’t work? A clever trick indeed. No wonder so many anti-Semites believe in a worldwide Jewish conspiracy).

Why would people want to come to this country to claim benefits, when our social security system is one of the least generous in the EU? Any poor bogus asylum seeker who wants to emigrate here for this reason has spent too long in Sangatte reading yesterdays’ Daily Mail (if there is an immigration problem, then, perhaps they should shoulder part of the blame). As for taking our jobs, new immigrants often find work that many Britons are unqualified for, or are unwilling to do. Immigrants are often highly economically productive and successful, working hard at their second chance, their fresh start.

But still the bullshit lies persists, going unquestioned by people who are happy to believe and spout nonsensical rubbish because it sounds more plausible and reasonable than out and out racism. I remember once going on a course with an unpleasant character from another office. As we sat eating lunch, he went through the whole list of stereotypical nonsense; that we have an open door immigration policy, we just let anyone in; they don’t want to integrate, none of them; they take our jobs, et cetera. I was looking anxiously about the room, trying to spy an escape route, when he said “and they all drive better cars than I do”. I nearly choked to death on my sandwich, there and then. He may have been a nasty racist, but fortunately he was also a dab hand at the Heimlich Manoeuvre; if he hadn’t been I probably wouldn’t be here now, maligning him.

But the line about the car, or similar, is surprisingly prevalent in the argument against immigration. I remember watching Newsnight a year or so back, when they featured a North Wales council estate that accommodated a number of refugees; refugees mind you, not illegal immigrants, or asylum seekers, but people whose request for asylum had been accepted. I can’t remember exactly where the report was set, but I recall the town looked even worse then Queensferry (my apologies to anyone from Queensferry; for criticising your home town, and for having to live there). The reporter spoke to a number of the local youths, and asked them what they thought of the refugees. Their comments were not altogether kind, but the main complaints were that a) they all had mobile phones, and b) they were prepared to work for minimum wage, or less, while the locals themselves wouldn’t work for so little. To be honest, these indigenous youths didn’t look like they really wanted to work at all, ever, but perhaps I am being unkind.

What I find strange – well I don’t really, but what I would like to find strange – is that when the BNP and their like criticise immigrants for just coming over here to claim benefit, they don’t seem to subject our own home-grown benefit claimants to the same scrutiny, as if social security abuse is solely the preserve of weird foreigners. I wonder why? Is it because in doing so they know they would be having a go at a potentially rich source of new recruits; that they think it is better for such people to have their fears and prejudices stoked up, rather than for them to face the same criticisms they aim at asylum seekers?

Imagine the refugees walking past the locals on that estate, on their way to another long day at work, hearing the verbal abuse and name calling; I have no problem with mobile phone wielding, hard working people, wherever they may originate from, and I would argue with anyone who would call for their repatriation. As for their indigenous accusers, idly watching the immigrants en route to work, shouting their intolerant venom, I wonder; could a case be made for their depatriation?

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Thursday 20th January 2005

Diplomadic Immunity

I don’t know if anyone bothers to look at my short list of Links (and I hope it will stay short; I don’t intend having one of those seemingly endless Blogrolls that list about 200 sites. I don’t see the point). Anyway, there have been a few changes to it recently, namely

  • It’s goodbye to Walking Like Giant Cranes. Jarod has called it a day, which is a great shame. Where else would you read about the etymology of the word “Quavers” (Peruvian for Cheese-flavoured, apparently), or the famous riots during the 80’s caused by the introduction of Ham flavour Quavers. He will be missed.
  • It’s hello to Boomablog. This is part politeness; for reasons best know to the author of Boomablog, The Obscurer is listed as one of only three sites on his Blogroll. I don’t know what I have done to deserve such an honour, but I am appropriately flattered. It is not just politeness, however; Boomablog is an amusing and well-written site that I will visit regularly; otherwise I would not place it in my list of links.
  • Also, a warm welcome to Our Word Is Our Weapon. The blog’s author, Jim, was very kind to me in his comments on my Tsunami post, so I would like to return the favour. His blog makes for fine and informative reading; and even if his level of statistical analysis is way in advance of my abilities in that area, I will try my best to keep up.

Jim’s world view seems quite similar to my own, which of course helps, but I will endeavour to keep an open mind when I read his blog, and not take what he says at face value just because I may agree with him; otherwise I may as well not read anything by anyone else, and just tell myself that I am right on every subject. For this reason, I will continue to read The Filter^, in particular for Anthony’s posts written from a libertarian perspective. I often don’t agree fully with what he has to say, but they are always interesting, positive and thought provoking posts, free from the negative sniping and point scoring that often passes for comment in other blogs.

When I first started writing this blog, I really didn’t know what I was getting myself into. I hadn’t so much as read another blog, and it was just by investigating the “Blog This” button on my Google toolbar that I stumbled upon the Blogger website and decided to have a go. I didn’t know what was expected of the blogger, so I just decided to just get off my chest some things that I wanted airing, to publish them on the web, and allow my opinions to be opened up to ridicule (actually that’s not quite true; I never expected anyone to read my blog at all. I certainly didn’t think people would find their way here by trying to find methods for defrosting their cars via Google, just because I’d written this post. I can only apologise for wasting so many peoples’ time). I was surprised to discover just how many other blogs there were out there, and also that some people clearly seemed to have far too much time on their hands. I realised that I could probably just about muster one or two posts a week, but some people seemed to average around six a day, which I still find mind-boggling. But the most surprising thing I found when first taking a trip into the blogosphere (and shoot me if I ever use that term again; or if I ever use “hat tip” at all) was how many bloggers feel that blogging is an alternative to the mainstream media, rather than just being a place where people can speak their mind; that it is somehow more truthful and accurate than the rest of the media, that it is better at reporting how things are. On the Iraq War, for example, what united many bloggers, both anti-war and pro-war, was that they believed the media was biased against their viewpoint; but both sides couldn’t be right.

In recent days, this belief in the superiority of the blog has been seen most sharply in the glowing praise The Diplomad has been receiving. Particularly on the subject of the UN and its response (or lack of response) to the Tsunami, all it seems to take is for The Diplomad to report something and it flies around the blogo… I mean it flies around the blogging fraternity and is reported as incontrovertible fact; a welcome voice battling through the lies and omissions of the media. And not just in the blogging world; even the dreaded mainstream media itself has got in on the act. Christopher Booker in the Telegraph writes that the main story of the week is the “startling contrast between the impotence of the international organisations, the UN and the EU, and the remarkable efficiency of the US and Australian military on the ground” when dealing with the Tsunami relief effort. In covering this story he says, “the BBC’s performance has become a national scandal”, that its coverage is biased because they think everything is “a case of ‘UN and EU good, US and military bad'”. Instead he thinks we should be listening to the “wonderfully outspoken Diplomad run undercover by members of the US State Department”.

Well, if you haven’t already, read a bit of The Diplomad and see what you think. It may indeed be the unvarnished truth. It may be a complete pack of lies. Either way, it is clearly a heavily subjective account by someone who seems to be a hugely disaffected malcontent. Nothing wrong with that, he/she is entitled to his/her opinion, but it is just that; the writers’ opinion. For Christopher Booker, or anyone else, to reject the BBC’s coverage in favour of the Diplomad’s is to reject the coverage of a broadcaster with a remit for impartiality (even if you feel they have not fulfilled this particularly well) in favour of the opinions of someone who makes no such claim. You may as well praise the wonderfully outspoken statements of a bloke you sat next to on the bus. Personally, I need a little more to go on before I treat the word of an anonymous source as fact.

But people will do just that, because to reverse what Booker thinks of the BBC (and presumably what he thinks of most of the rest of the media), some people are of the opinion that the UN/EU are all bad and the US/military all good. If the mainstream media do not reflect this view, they surmise that the media must be wrong, and a blog that tells a different story must be right. There is much about mainstream journalism that is ripe for criticism, but rather than replace it I would like to think that blogs can supplement and complement the rest of the media, that they can widen the debate, and overall I think that they can; but if they are just going to be read by people who trawl the internet looking for something which mirrors their own prejudices, then I may have to think again.

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Thursday 13th January 2005

What Insight Meant

A rather remarkable event occurred during the Everton v Manchester City game at Goodison Park on Boxing Day; Robbie Fowler, once the most feared English striker in football (and who is still considered – by generous souls who haven’t watched him play for a while – to be the best natural finisher in the game) actually scored a goal. With his head. (Alas it was wasted; City lost the game due to 2 Everton goals scored with ease by players decked in Royal Blue, untroubled by the attentions of City’s defenders) What I want to talk about, however, is what happened immediately after Fowler’s goal.

As the ball hit the back of the Everton net, Fowler set off for the Gladwys Street end where the Everton faithful sit, then ran the full length of the pitch (so showing the sort of stamina which has been missing since his Liverpool days), slapping the top of his head as he did so, before celebrating in front of the travelling City fans. It was a bizarre sight, and what happened next came as no surprise.

Fowler was booked for inciting the crowd, and in this day and age, rightly or wrongly, it is something you have to accept; the referee had no option but to produce the yellow card. There was then a similarly predictable reaction; on Match of the Day the assumption was that Fowler was slapping his head to celebrate the fact he had scored a header, and across the media there was the usual line that his actions in trying to rile the Everton fans were typical of Robbie, and were regrettable. Merseyside Police got involved and asked City manager Kevin Keegan for his comments, which seems a bit of a overreaction but again is not surprising. 3 scenarios present themselves here; that an Everton fan complained to the Police; that the Police felt they had to be seen to take some action; or that a Senior Officer with no idea of what the Police’s priorities should be got involved. I suspect a combination of the three.

A few days later I was chatting to a mate of mine, an Evertonian who had been to the match. I wondered what he had thought? First off, he told me that all the way through the game, Fowler was being targeted by the Everton fans, and taunted with the chant “Smackhead”; this put Fowler’s reaction to his goal in a different light, I thought, and I was quite impressed. To respond to “smackhead” taunts by scoring a header, then celebrating by smacking you head, seems quite inspired; although still bound to attract the attentions of the referee.

“So,” I asked, “ how did the Everton fans react? We’re they appropriately incited?”
“I should say so,” said my mate, Mike, “the crowd went absolutely ballistic; the atmosphere was incredible.”

And this is my point really; Fowler was booked for inciting the crowd; but for inciting them to do what? If they had invaded the pitch, or attacked the City fans, or thrown bricks into the dugout, then Fowler could be said to have instigated something nasty; but was that ever likely to happen? In fact, he wound up the Evertonians so the volume of their singing and chanting increased, inevitably spurring the City fans to do the same, and the atmosphere of the game improved immensely as a result. And isn’t it the atmosphere that we really pay for when we hand over our absurd amounts of money at the Ticket Office?

Sometimes you wonder if sports commentators have any inkling about what fans really feel (the exception to this is the excellent Adrian Chiles on Match of the Day 2). The classic disconnect is on the subject of punch-ups on the field; for the media nothing appals them more than such indiscipline, which sets a bad example to the children watching, brings the games reputation into disrepute, blah blah blah…For a fan, particularly one watching a dull 0-0 stalemate on a cold evening, there is nothing better than a fight, to get the crowds tails up and turn up the volume, to get you supporting your wronged players (even if, secretly, you saw your defender get in that tug which provoked the opposition, and you would have been appalled yourself if the situation had been reversed; only it wasn’t ).

My mate said that it was the most exciting City/Everton game he had seen for ages; and we have seen some pretty bad ones between us over the years. That this game was different was partly due to Robbie Fowler and his incitment of the crowd. For his troubles he received a yellow card; he should have received the Man of the Match award, and our thanks.

UPDATE 15/1/05: Fowler scores again! And has a very good game overall, actually.

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Thursday 6th January 2005

After The Tsunami

I haven’t written about the Tsunami before, because I haven’t written about much at all recently; the Christmas period has found me ridiculously busy, and when it hasn’t found me busy it has found me poorly. Also, my young son is now walking a lot more and sleeping a lot less, which impacts upon my free time and may well ultimately challenge the whole viability of this blog; but for the time being I am still here.

However, specifically relating to the Tsunami, I somewhat agree for once with Mark Steyn when he says that, initially at least, “It didn’t seem the kind of thing to have an ‘opinion’ on, even for an opinion columnist – not like who should win the election or whether we should have toppled Saddam. It was obviously a catastrophe, and it was certain the death toll would keep rising, and other than that there didn’t seem a lot to opine about.”

But of course eventually Steyn has found something to comment on, as have I; and it is about the way people have reacted to the crisis, and the issues surrounding it, specifically the whole issue of aid and how it is administered. I have been amazed about the petty, trivial issues which have aroused comment in the wake of such a terrible event.

For one thing there has been the relentless criticisms of the Government. Now, I speak as someone who thinks of Blair as a sickening, self-obsessed individual, leading a party about which the best that can be said it that they are not the Tories; but the constant sniping about whether or not Blair should have cut short his holiday just leaves me baffled with the irrelevance of it. I have my own ideas, as I’m sure does everybody, about whether Blair has acted correctly, but in the grand scheme of things, when we are dealing with a matter which has left 150,000 dead, the whys and wherefores about Blair’s holiday rate for little; and yet this theme has been returned to again and again. Then there have been the continuous updates on how much money the British public have raised for the Tsunami appeal, which is all well and good; but this is then used as a stick to beat the Government with over its own contribution. Why? Who are the people criticising how much the Government (in reality, of course, the Taxpayer) is providing? They are not the charities themselves, or the Governments of the affected peoples, who you would imagine have some idea of what sums are required, but journalists, happy to sow some discord in order to fill column inches or air time. Then when Gordon Brown floats the idea of debt relief for the affected nations, before he has even closed his mouth we hear questions about “how can we ensure this debt relief will be spent wisely?”; a valid question perhaps, but one which surely can wait until the proposal is actually accepted. It seems more important to criticise and pick holes than actually report the facts. One valid point is the questioning of the 3 minutes silence for the victims of the tsunami; why 3 minutes, it has been asked, rather than 2 minutes, or 1. This is actually something I can understand – I would say a 2 minutes silence is sufficient – but it seemed totally unnecessary for there to be criticism of the 3 minutes on the day of the silence itself; for example, the Daily Mail interviewed a war veteran, asking him his opinions in the light of there only being a 2 minutes silence on Armistice Day. Was it not possible to do the decent thing, to just observe the silence, and to hold the post-mortem some other time?

Regarding the amounts of aid money which have been provided around the world, there is something unpleasant I think in so many reports giving space to tables showing who has given what, as if there is some sort of competition going on to prove who is the most generous. This meant that originally some accused the United States of being stingy due to their small initial aid pledge; this despite the the fact that US Armed forces were some of the first to deliver aid, and that the aid pledge itself was then massively increased, making the critics look rather silly. In turn, however, this initial raw data was then endlessly analysed by people who don’t like the conclusions drawn from some of these tables, and they sought to re-interpret the figures to prove their own point. It all seemed like an unseemly scrabble to justify your position to me, and for what? Do the people who write these thing poll their friends on how much they have given to charity, then adjust the figures based on each persons income, then expenditure, then saving, and keep playing around with statistics until there is a table of generosity with themselves sat at the top?

Others have used the Tsunami to defend and support their own world view, however inappriaoriate it may all seem; so we have my dear friends at Biased BBC hitting out at what they perceive as the corporation’s anti-American bias in their coverage (presumably this is a different BBC to the one I have heard referring to the US as leading the aid effort). One way to support your world view is to talk about who is best (and as a consequence, who is worst) at administering the aid; so, Tim Worstall decides the situation is useful ammunition to criticise what he sees as failings in the UN, the EU, the State in general…basically everything he argues against anyway; Clare Short uses the tragedy to attack the US, Blair and the Iraq War; and Mark Steyn, apparently stung by what he sees as criticism of the US response, answers with some of his own, well worn anti-UN rhetoric.

Now I don’t know exactly what is going on in the relief effort in South East Asia – I’m not there – but I don’t feel I am gaining much from such reporting which generally seem light on fact and heavy on bias, is largely anecdotal, and is more comment than commentary. Of course the media do have an important role in highlighting genuine problems in administering aid, but much of what has been written seems vague and one sided. I understand that Steyn’s article, for example, was written in response to what he felt were unfair comments by Jan Egeland of the UN, but in all it begins looking like a tit-for-tat exercise, “my aid is bigger and better than your aid” and I just don’t see the point. And even if some of the criticisms are valid – and I dare say all parties could be criticised to some degree if you want to look hard enough – is this really the time to climb aboard your favourite hobby-horse? Jim of “Our word is our weapon” is surely right when he says “Why should it be so hard to say that everyone who is helping those affected by the tsunami – be they local people, Australian marines, American helicopter pilots, and yes, even United Nations staff – deserve our thanks and admiration?”. An obvious point you would have though, but one which looks like it has to be made.

It used to be said that crises brought everyone together, however diverse our opinions. Whether this was ever true I don’t know, but it certainly doesn’t seem to be the case judging by some individuals’ take on the terrible events of Boxing Day. You would think that the silly things that divide us would count for little in the face of such a monumental tragedy. But it seems not.

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