Alex Massie

Alex Massie

Friday

Alex Massie

Two Second World War Stories

From our UK edition

Riots today in Tobruk and Benghazi, places largely known to me from films and histories and comics of the Second World War. The scale of that conflict is, in some ways, ever-harder for people of my generation to grasp. Not only has there been nothing like it since (mercifully), it's hard to imagine anything like it happening again. Of course, that's what people have thought about war before. Two things popped up in my RSS feed today, telling stories of unknown or little-remembered aspects of the war. First, from Tom Ricks: During World War II, the [United States] Army intentionally formed a unit chockablock with fascisti and their suspected sympathizers. [...

Alex Massie

What Cricket Tells Us About David Cameron

From our UK edition

Peter Oborne has an excellent column in the Telegraph today. Much of it reprises Peter's case that Cameron is a genuine reforming Prime Minister and that the Big Society (or whatever you want to call it) is Cameron's way of refuting the certainties of the post-war settlement and the excesses of Thatcherism. But wittingly or not it also highlights (deliberately I'm sure) some of the weaknesses of the Prime Minister's style. Reflecting on Cameron the cricketer, Peter* writes: Before he became famous, I sometimes used to play cricket with David Cameron. He was an expansive middle-order batsman who possessed all the strokes necessary to assemble a decent score.

Thursday

Alex Massie

Fianna Fail: Winning the Anarchist Vote (Though Not Much Else)

From our UK edition

Who knew Sligo Town was such a cradle for logic and anarchy? If only more usually-pointless TV vox pops were like this. The Economist observed this week that regret is one of the prevailing moods in Ireland these days. Perhaps so, but there's resignation too. The election will prove momentarily cathartic but the deal struck with the ECB and IMF is unlikely to be reshaped significantly and, hence, the election is being held in a strange, make-believe land in which all agree to pretend it matters hugely despite a widespread suspicion that the game is rigged and has, in fact, already been decided. It's not quite just for show and decency but it feels as though it might almost be.

Wednesday

Alex Massie

First Egypt Falls, Is Ireland Next?

From our UK edition

Today's entertainment in the Irish election is generously provided by Ned O'Keeffe who, thoughtfully, warns that the Irish army may be poised to take over the country. The outgoing Cork TD (Fianna Fail naturally) may be on to something. Perhaps there is a pro-coup constituency that, sure, wouldn't be thinking a military regime would be the worst thing. Couldn't do as much harm as the last lot, you know. Anyway: According to a report published in today’s Evening Echo, Mr O’Keeffe said “The situation has become so bad that an Army coup is a real possibility.

Alex Massie

Eck The Comeback Kid?

From our UK edition

Though this blog has tried to ignore the fact, there are elections to the Scottish Parliament this year. In just over ten weeks time in fact. I've ignored the subject because, frankly, the idea of Iain Gray - he's the leader of the Labour party in Scotland - becoming First Minister is too depressing to contemplate before the idea is thrust upon us by cruel reality and dastardly necessity. Mr Gray is the fifth person to lead Labour's Holyrood group since devolution and by some hefty distance the least impressive. This is a low bar to fail to clear but there you have it. For months now it has looked as though Labour would "win" the right to govern with no new ideas at all.

Tuesday

Alex Massie

Gerry Adams Redefines Terrorism

From our UK edition

Gerry Adams, appearing on the Irish radio station Newstalk this afternoon, denounced the proposed Universal Social Charge (ie, tax) as being little more or less than "an act of gross terrorism". He also complained that Micheal Martin's suggestion that Adams's past membership of the IRA might prove a problem for some voters was a "slur". I suppose this is true since a slur is an insinuation or allegation that is likely to insult someone or damage their reputation. It does not, you will note, mean that the insinuation or allegation is untrue.

Alex Massie

Another Rotten Argument Against Voting Reform

From our UK edition

Iain Martin is surely right to suppose that unveiling celebrities and luvvies who support changing the voting system is a good way for the Yes to AV campaign to lose support. But it's not as if the No campaign is playing a blinder either. Today's Dreadful Argument for Retaining First Past the Post argues that we simply cannot afford to change the voting system. Apparently it will cost "up to £250 million" to do so. Colour me sceptical. In the first place, there are the costs of the referendum itself (£91m it is claimed) and these might also be considered the cost of retaining FPTP. The best that may be said is that this is an argument against referenda, not against this particular proposal. Already, then, the actual cost of AV is down to £159m.

Alex Massie

An Unfriended Government

From our UK edition

Perhaps it's because it's a coalition and this novelty is too subtle a thing to be grasped by Fleet Street, but it's still strange how unpopular this government has become. Not with the public; that was to be expected given the decision to stress nothing but deficits and cuts during the Camerlegg ministry's first few months in office. But you might have thought its inky friends might have stuck around a little longer. Then again, they can feel the wind shifting too. One consequence of the decision to stress fiscal austerity - perfectly reasonable and even, you may say, necessary - was to confirm, or seem to confirm, one of Labour's election campaign charges: the Tories are mainly interested in cutting public (that is, government) services.

Monday

Alex Massie

Nick Clegg is Right. Again.

From our UK edition

Last week's civil liberties bill was hardly perfect but it's still a step in the right direction. And, frankly, it's bonny and startling in equal measure to have a Deputy Prime Minister who says things like this: "I need to say this – you shouldn't trust any government, actually including this one. You should not trust government – full stop. The natural inclination of government is to hoard power and information; to accrue power to itself in the name of the public good." I'm quite happy to oblige Mr Clegg. I don't trust this government either. I think it's intentions are often fine but I doubt whether it has the courage of those convictions.

Sunday

Alex Massie

Spotify Sunday: Fill Your Ears

From our UK edition

To conclude our ‘True Grit Week’, we’ve asked our favourite Country and Western aficionado, our colleague Alex Massie, to compose a special C&W playlist. Hickory Wind – The ByrdsThe Byrds were never better than during the spell Gram Parsons was present. Sweetheart of the Rodeo is a near-faultless album and ‘Hickory Wind’ perhaps its standout track. Boulder to Birmingham – Emmylou HarrisYou could cheerfully pick any number of Emmylou songs but her tribute to Parsons is as good a place to start as any and, frankly, better than most. Sublime. Tecumseh Valley – Townes van ZandtNo collection is complete without a nod to the prince of Texas singer-songwriters.

Friday

Alex Massie

Egypt: Now the Hard Work Begins

From our UK edition

Well, well, well, how the worm turns. I refer the Honourable Gentleman to the post I wrote some hours ago. Again, it's worth noting that this is just the end of the beginning, not the beginning of the end. The Pessimists may yet be proved right but this, at last, is a day for the Optimists. There's no guarantee that Egypt can build the kind of future that will satisfy the economic and political aspirations of its people but nor is it inevitable that it will swap secular authoritarianism for religious authoritarianism. At the moment, and today at least, one of the losers from this process is Osama bin Laden.

Alex Massie

Obama to Mubarak: Your Time Is Up

From our UK edition

The Americans have made their move and it's not good news for Hosni Mubarak's friends and defenders. This is the statement released by President Obama tonight: The Egyptian people have been told that there was a transition of authority, but it is not yet clear that this transition is immediate, meaningful or sufficient. Too many Egyptians remain unconvinced that the government is serious about a genuine transition to democracy, and it is the responsibility of the government to speak clearly to the Egyptian people and the world. The Egyptian government must put forward a credible, concrete and unequivocal path toward genuine democracy, and they have not yet seized that opportunity.

Thursday

Alex Massie

Mubarak to Egypt: Drop Dead

From our UK edition

Seventeen Days that Shook the World? Not so fast, my friend! Hosni Mubarak's speech this evening was many things but it wasn't much of a resignation statement. Mostly, it was a nationalist plea for Middle Egypt's sympathy vote. Presenting himself as father of the nation - including his "children" gathered in Tahrir Square and in cities across the country - Mubarak's pitch seemed more likely to appeal to that generation's parents. How many Egyptian youths are really preoccupied with the moment the Egyptian flag was hoisted over the Sinai? How many, surveying their gloomy economic prospects and the lack of political opportunity, care about the past? Precious few. Nor, for that matter, can they buy the notion that the outside world has been interfering in Egypt's domestic affairs.

Alex Massie

17 Days That Shook the World

From our UK edition

The extraordinary scenes in Cairo today should not blind us to the fact that Hosni Mubarak's apparent departure is not the beginning of the end but merely the end of the beginning. The army may have assured the protestors - whose gallantry, courage and peaceful presence on the streets of Egypt's cities has been as startling as it has been wondrous - that their demands will be met but those demands cannot be satisfied just by Hosni Mubarak's departure. It's not just personal, you might say, it's business too. And that business is real and verifiable reform. Like Brother Korski I remain optimistic that momentum now lies with the reform movement. Omar Suleiman is no kind of acceptable replacement. Nor, in anything other than the short-term, is the army.

Alex Massie

Conservatives and Prisons: A Study in Contradiction?

From our UK edition

Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, asks a good question: When it comes to education, pensions, health care, Social Security, and hundreds of other government functions, conservatives are a beacon for fiscal responsibility, accountability, and limited government — the very principles that have made this country great. However, when it comes to criminal-justice spending, the “lock ’em up and throw away the key” mentality forces conservatives to ignore these fundamental principles. With nearly every state budget strained by the economic crisis, it is critical that conservatives begin to stand up for criminal-justice policies that ensure the public’s safety in a cost-effective manner.

Alex Massie

Tinker, Tailor, Banker, Spy

From our UK edition

Project Merlin? Really? Never mind the detail of the plan to "deal with" the banks and their bonuses, my first reaction was to wonder if some Treasury chap with a sense of humour has been reading* Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy recently. Source Merlin, you will recall, peddles product Witchcraft to the Circus and nearly succeeds in bringing the whole bloody thing crashing down. Not that I'm suggesting George Osborne is Bill Haydon, of course... Still, with grave apologies to John Le Carre for this thievery, here's how it may have played: From the new Control, according to the file, nothing. Perhaps he was lying low and praying it would blow over.

Alex Massie

Who Wants Strong Government Anyway?

From our UK edition

James's column in this week's edition of the magazine (subscribe!) is characteristically excellent but it has produced one odd response already. Tim Montgomerie worries that it might be harder to pass "unpopular legislation" if the British electoral system is changed from First Past the Post to the Alternative Vote. Like other opponents of AV, Tim fears it will help produce "weak, lowest common denominator government". He quotes James: "If AV passed, Cameron would find managing his parliamentary party almost impossible. Suddenly, the priority for Tory MPs would be to make themselves acceptable as a second choice to those who didn’t vote for them last time rather than supporting the government’s agenda...

Tuesday

Alex Massie

Hope on the Nile: Islam Does Not Have All the Answers

From our UK edition

Not to grant him guru status or anything but I'm glad that Reuel Marc Gerecht has at last weighed-in on the Egypt Question. I've mentioned his writing before and think him one of the most interesting, and in some ways provocative, middle-east analysts. Even if you disagree with him, his ideas are worth serious consideration. His view that President Obama could usefully say "We are not scared of muslims voting" seems persuasive to me. So too his conclusion that it is time to "put an end to the West’s deleterious habit of treating the Middle East’s potentates respectfully and the Muslim citizenry like children." He writes: Mr. Bush’s distastefulness helped to blind Westerners to the momentous marriage of Islamism and democratic ideas.

Alex Massie

Jeb! Jeb! Jeb!

From our UK edition

November 8th, 1994 is one of the hinge moments in modern American politics. If you wanted to write a counter-factual chronicle of recent American politics you could do worse than begin with the night George W Bush was elected Governor of Texas and Jeb Bush was defeated by Lawton Chiles in Florida. The 63,940 votes by which Chiles defeated Jeb changed American politics. Jeb, you see, was supposed to be the Guy. He was the Bush who would make it big on the national stage. 1994 changed that, knocking Jeb out the game and opening a door for Dubya. Bill Minutaglio's biography of George suggests that the brothers' parents saw it that way too. George Sr and Barbara were more concerned with consoling Jeb than congratulating George Jr. Just this once, can't you be happy for me?

Monday

Alex Massie

The Great Dictator

From our UK edition

From Sebastian Faulks's reflections on Jeeves: It is the exact balance of the sweetness of revenge for Jeeves and the vast relief that Bertie feels that makes the endings of the novels so satisfactory. The point is that this happy world must not change. Bachelorhood for Bertie is the deal-breaker for Jeeves, but there are other elements of Jeeves’s enchanted world that he must fight to preserve. There are rules; they may seem trivial, but not to him: someone must ensure that it all remains the same, and the task falls to Jeeves. A gentleman’s trouser bottoms should “shimmer, not break” on the instep of his shoe, according to Jeeves.