Archive for March, 2003
ENGAGEMENT AND INDEPENDENCE
Some good points raised by Neal Ascherson on the post-war needs of Iraq.
Incredibly, with American tanks half way to Baghdad, there is still no agreement on how to run a military occupation regime, let alone on a programme to reconstruct an Iraqi state. (The best suggestion so far is for a UN “blue police force” [...]
Posted: March 24th, 2003 under Misc.
INFILTRATION?
Roy Hattersley makes an appeal for opponents of Tony Blair in the Labour Party to stay in the party and, in the words of Hugh Gaitskell “fight, fight and fight again”.
Certainly there is no point in people who are serious about progressive politics leaving the only game in town and the far left is littered [...]
Posted: March 24th, 2003 under Misc.
BLOGS AND WAR
I’m glad that most of the British bloggers aren’t doing much in the way of ‘war blogging’ and I hope it stays that way.
I spent a bit of time this morning checking out the American blogs that are linking away on every bit of news they can find and to be frank it is not [...]
Posted: March 23rd, 2003 under Misc.
HUMAN SHIELD
Its easy to laugh at the western volunteer ‘human shields’ in Baghdad but as this article shows they are not at all stupid and at least one of them has learnt something from his trip.
Posted: March 23rd, 2003 under Misc.
LABOUR’S FUTURE - LIBERTARIAN SOCIALISM?
Peter Hain’s comments last week that the government will have to take a more radical stance in order to regain its standing after the war, were treated as though such a new agenda would merely be a cynical way to win back support and that Labour would need to ‘look left’ again after spending so [...]
Posted: March 22nd, 2003 under Misc.
MEDIA BIAS AND THE WAR
“Truth is the first casualty of war” - how many times have you heard or read that old cliche in recent weeks? I’m sick of hearing it.
Of course only a fool believes the propaganda that comes out of the mouth of officials of the fascist regime in Baghdad who seem to believe that the best [...]
Posted: March 22nd, 2003 under Misc.
MEDIA AND WAR
I’m watching Sky News most of the time. It really is the best 24 hour news channel around and far preferable to CNN these days, although I have been flicking to Fox News to get a, ahem, different perspective on things.
Actually, in terms of reporting Fox is not really as bad as people make out. [...]
Posted: March 21st, 2003 under Misc.
NO FLAGS PLEASE, WE’RE BRITISH
That US flag I was talking about has been removed from Umm Qasr
Posted: March 21st, 2003 under Misc.
WHO CAN STOP THE PROTESTS?
These people can - and do you believe the spokesman’s version of events?
Posted: March 20th, 2003 under Misc.
WE WILL NOT FLY OUR FLAGS
“We go to liberate not to conquer. We will not fly our flags in their country” Lieutenant Colonel Tim Collins of the 1st Battalion of the Royal Irish.
Our allies are predictably less sensitive.
Posted: March 20th, 2003 under Misc.