Alex Massie

Alex Massie

Saturday

Alex Massie

Saturday Morning Country: Gillian Welch & Gospel

You can't have a country music series without acknowledging the contribution church music has made to the genre. The thing about the gospel music that sprang from the this topsoil of the Appalachian mountains is that, for, or rather because of, all its desperation, there remains an essential glimmer of hope that, in the next world at least, things will be better and more comfortably arranged than they are in this. It's the contrast between the fatalism of the present and the promise of the future that gives it a mighty, if mournful, punch. And one of the most famous of these hymns is "I'll Fly Away" which has been recorded by Hank Williams, Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Randy Travis and a host of others. It also featured in the soundtrack to Oh Brother, Where Art Thou.

Alex Massie

Gordon Brown, Caroline Flint, the Scorpion and the Frog

Of all the blunders made by Gordon Brown and his henchmen, few were as easily avoidable as that which led to Caroline Flint's resignation. Equally, few do more to illuminate a simple, but vital truth: Gordon Brown just isn't very good at politics. Flint might have been a troublesome minister and far too close to Hazel Blears for her own good, but so what? And, sure, perhaps she was being presumptious when she asked for a better job as the price for her loyalty and willingness to make a fool of herself by defending the beleaguered Prime Minister in public. But, again, so what? There are plenty of jobs avaialable and, let's face it, not too many even semi-plausible candidates to fill them (Hello, Mrs Kinnock!). It would have been easy to keep Flint happy.

Friday

Alex Massie

A Message from Gordon Brown

El Gordo addresses the nation: This government will never stop fighting for ordinary people in these extraordinary times. Today I have reshaped the government around three clear priorities. Cleaning up politics, getting through this downturn fairly and giving people greater control over their public services. We need a clean up of our politics in this country. Politicians must serve the public, and not themselves. We will act quickly to bring in an independent regulator to scrutinise the behaviour of our MPs. We will introduce a tough, legally binding code of conduct for MPs. In addition every single expense claim made by MPs of all parties over the last four years will be scrutinised by an independent audit panel.

Alex Massie

Alan Sugar: the rare rat that joins a sinking ship

Could anything more confirm this government's hapless, pointless, useless, desperate, incompetence than the appointment of Alan Sugar* as "Enterprise Czar" (whatever the hell that is)? Doubtless this is something to do with the idea of a "government of all the talents". Sheesh. Still, why end here? Readers are invited to speculate which of these preposterous characters should be the next to join the government and which jobs they should have: Richard & Judy Gillian McKeith Ant & Dec Ainsley Harriot Noel Edmonds Carol Vorderman Paul Daniels Simon Cowell Susan Boyle *American readers will have been spared having to know who Sugar is.

Alex Massie

What about the Ministry of Defence?

Via Facebook, a friend makes a very good point: John Hutton's successor as Secretary of State for Defence will be the fifth person to hold that job in the last five years. No wonder there's a total lack of continuity at the MoD. This is, to put it mildly, no way to treat what should be one of the most important jobs in government. And this at a time when, however fitfully, we've been fighting two wars. One trusts that the next government will treat the MoD more seriously. But, as I've suggested, when it comes to Tory defence policy there seems to be quite a bit of heavy-lifting that still needs to be done.

Thursday

Alex Massie

To vote or not to vote?

I'd been thinking that I might as well vote today but Chris Dillow makes a pretty good case for not bothering to endorse any of the parties seeking one's support. Also, the Scottish european election campaign has, if anything, been even more of a non-event than it seems to have been elsewhere. That is, the minor party that might do well here is the Greens and they're hardly worth getting worked up about, let alone going out of one's way to vote against. Not very civic-minded, perhaps. But who truly cares whether the Lib Dems win a european seat or whether Labour holds onto its second? UPDATE: OK, folks, I did vote. After all, the polling station only required a 250m detour en route to tonight's Twenty20* match** against Melrose.

Alex Massie

Obama in Cairo

I have no doubt that Barack Obama's speech in Cairo today will not have gone down well amongst American conservatives. In fact many of them will be appalled by it. How long before someone in the right-wing blogosphere writes something about how terrible, if unsurprising, it was to see an American President protstrate himself in such humiliating fashion. All the right's worst fears have com to pass! It's like Jimmy Carter has returned to the White House! And, I guess, you could pull some lines from the speech that made it seem as though Obama was "apologising" for the United States while rarely putting as much emphasis on the sins of the muslim world. But that would be to miss the point: the arab and muslim worlds don't need to be lectured by the United States, they need to be engaged.

Wednesday

Alex Massie

Egyptian Reformers Boycott Obama’s Speech

More on the disappointing lack of emphasis Obama places on human rights and democratic reform. Mike Crowley reports from Cairo that Ayman Nour, the Egyptian dissident, has turned down an invitation to attend Obama's speech tomorrow: The president's reticence to push Mubarak about democracy, Nour says, has been "a huge disappointment, not only from Egypt's perspective but for reformers all over the world. It's not in line with what he promised during the campaign, or with his inaugural speech on January 20." In particular, Nour called the recent 60 percent reduction of U.S. aid for democracy promotion in Egypt a "grave" move, and said that a new approach of channeling that aid through the government, rather than sending it directly to NGO-style groups.

Alex Massie

Barack Obama’s Super-Secret Desire to Impose Sharia Law

Melanie Phillips is, of course, correct to point out that Barack Obama's statement that the US is one of the larger muslim countries in the world is an exaggeration - though also, I would say (though Melanie might not), an understandable one. However she then writes: Just what planet is this US President on? Or is this not a statement but an aspiration? This is intriguing and I'd be interested to learn how the President might make the United States an islamic nation. Surely this was something he should have mentioned on the campaign trail? Clearly, his reticence about this confirms the seriousness of his intent. All the most dangerous plots are kept secret, dontcha know? Only the bravest and wisest can penetrate the conspiracy and sound the necessary alert.

Alex Massie

What is Britishness?

Commenting on this post in which I suggested that the BNP's electoral tactics are not dissimilar to those employed by Sinn Fein in the Republic of Ireland, NDM asked that I clarify what I meant when I wrote: "Research shows just 20 per cent of working-class Brits believe that being white is an ‘important factor’ in being British." Maybe this isn't a surprising statistic and perhaps I've spent too much time living in rural Scotland or multi-coloured cities respectively but I'm not sure I'd have used the word "just" in relation to this depressing statistic." Re-reading this, I can see how it might be misinterpreted. My writing wasn't as clear as it should have been.

Tuesday

Alex Massie

Pigs at the Trough?

Now that the Tories have reopened their candidate selection process, there are going to be plenty of candidates wondering how best to take advantage of their opponents' extravagant expense claims. The intricacies of capital gains tax and "flipping" second homes are all very entertaining, but liable to become bogged down in legalese. Not so, by comparison, the hefty £400 MPs could claim for food each month.

Alex Massie

Ricky Jay & Susan Boyle

Ricky Jay has an op-ed in today's NYT on the Susan Boyle phenomenon. It's interesting - there may not be many people alive who know more about the history of freak shows and public oddities than Jay - but it's really just an excuse to point you towards Mark Singer's terrific New Yorker profile of Jay. It begins: The playwright David Mamet and the theatre director Gregory Mosher Taffirm that some years ago, late one night in the bar ofthe Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Chicago, this happened: Ricky Jay, who is perhaps the most gifted sleight-of-hand artist alive, was per- forming magic with a deck of cards. Also present was a friend of Mamet and Mosher's named Christ Nogulich, the director of food and beverage at the hotel.

Alex Massie

Why is Kevin Pietersen Playing in the Twenty20 World Cup?

Every so often someone at Lords remembers to trot out the line that Test Cricket is and must remain the pinnacle of the game; every time this happens something pops up that makes it harder than ever to take the ECB seriously when they say this. Not that the ECB are the only culprits; the ICC is just as bad. The latest evidence supporting the sense that given the opportunity to protect or devalue test cricket he people running English cricket will invariably choose the option that most damages the greatest form of the greatest game is the news that, despite being injured, Kevin Pietersen expects to play in this month's World Twenty20 Cup. Well, why not? It's not as though there's an important test series starting in July is there?

Alex Massie

Obama’s Human Rights and Democracy Hypocrisy

How committed is Obama to human rights? Not very, it seems. Perhaps his speech in Cairo on Thursday will change one's view of this, but the new President must be judged by actions, not merely words and noble intentions. As my friend Mike Crowley points out: But when it comes to Egypt, he has already set a tone. Obama has declined to make America's $1.8 billion in foreign aid to Egypt (our second-largest recipient) conditional on political and human-rights reform, and aid specifically for democratic programs has been slashed by more than half, from $55 million to $20 million. Hillary Clinton has spoken cautiously about Egypt's severe political repression. Cue much muttering about change you can believe in and all the rest of it.

Alex Massie

Who leads Iran?

Marty Peretz makes a sensible point: A story by Parisa Hafezi at Reuters knocks the wind out of the expectation that, if Dr. A'jad loses his re-election campaign, Iran's nuclear policy will be changed. These matters rest in the head and hands of the Ayatollah Al Khamenei, the Supreme Leader, successor to the revolutionary founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Ayatollah Khomeini. Well, it's a sort-of-sensible point. I'm not sure how many people really think that Iran's nuclear policy might change, regardless of the result of the elections. However, it is important that more people understand that Ahmadinejad is not the man in charge when it comes to Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Monday

Alex Massie

Oprah: The Queen of Snake-Oil

Michael Kinsley has a very entertaining take-down of the "new" Newsweek in this week's edition of the New Republic*. However, I doubt the "old" Newsweek would have dared publish this very entertaining, even brutal, demolition of Oprah Winfrey. In fact, it's the sort of piece one might imagine appearing in TNR. So, whatever the merits of Kinsley's piece and whatever the future may - or more probably does not - hold for Newsweek, anything that exposes Oprah's weird combination of sappy new age snake-oil and shameless hucksterism is no bad thing.

Alex Massie

How to deal with a problem like North Korea?

As Yglesias notes, it's uncanny how too many conservative pundits continue to believe that every problem is a nail and the only tool the United States possesses is a hammer. Now, like everyone else, I have no idea how we should deal with North Korea. And even that assumes that there is some kind of a deal that can be made. One thing I would ask, however, is that since NK seems to rather enjoy its pariah status - in as much as any paranoid regime can be said to enjoy anything - one wonders if increasing or tightening sanctions on NK is the most sensible tactic. In some sense, might this not actually confirm the North Korean diagnosis of their situation and actually make them more, not less, determined to annoy the rest of the international community?

Alex Massie

Gordon Brown’s Presbyterian Conscience

When a politician tries to make a virtue out of the fact that he was brought up in a household in which lying was frowned upon then, verily, you know he's on his uppers. Equally, though I daresay that much of the expenses scandal does offend the remnants of Gordon's "presbyterian conscience" it's not immediately clear that asserting his own membership of the Elect is necessarily going to endear the Prime Minister to his twin congregations at Westminster and in the country at large, each of which is manifestly fallen...

Saturday

Alex Massie

Saturday Morning Country: Nothing Ain’t Worth Nothing But It’s Free…

As a couple of commenters noted I was shamefully remiss in forgetting to post some quality country music last Saturday. My excuse? I was en route to the Heineken Cup final (Yay. Leinster!) but, frankly, that wasn't good enough. Today? I'm off to Langholm, representing Selkirk Cricket Club in our, possibly futile or at best unlikely, bid to thwart the Muckle Tooners from doing us in again. So, no more blogging today... Be that as it may, here's a super-good-one for y'all: Kris Kristofferson and the rest of the Highwaymen performing Kris's great (greatest?) song Me and Bobby McGee... How many of us would like to "trade all my tomorrows for just one yesterday"?

Friday

Alex Massie

Can Republicans win without Hispanic votes?

This is one of the Big Questions. Nate Silver was one of the biggest winners in last year's election and one is wary of suggesting that he's got this question wrong. Nevertheless, I rather suspect that he may have. He suggests that, in 2012 at least, the GOP could, perhaps should, consider giving up on the hispanic vote. The argument is that Republican weakness amongst latino voters didn't actually hurt the GOP all that much. That is, hispanic votes only make the difference in states that are trending Democratic anyway. Furthermore, there remains a path to 270 electoral college votes even if the Republicans concede Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada.