tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-128032522008-07-16T17:01:51.959ZBruschettaboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06462814606739183471noreply@blogger.comBlogger743125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-14530761096443219882008-07-15T18:54:00.004Z2008-07-16T16:46:16.437Z

Have I ever complained about journalists not doing basic research? Well, bugger me backwards, I'm going to do it again. Aaro: We are all stabbing blindly at knife crime. I awoke to an absurd discussion on the radio yesterday morning. Some chap from a northwestern accident and emergency ward was reacting to what he and many others believed were government plans to ferry young knife carriers

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-58692024155670775382008-07-13T07:16:00.002Z2008-07-13T07:26:58.905Z

Oh dear, it seems Nick has not been sacked by the Observer after all. Never mind. This week's offering is a barely coherent rumination on the xenophobia and isolationism of the Tory party. Exhibit A, afaics, is Tory policy toward intervention in the former Yugoslavia. The direct evidence that Tories "can be" anti-American is a crass remark by Malcolm Rifkind directed at John McCain and Bob Dole.

Captain Cabernetnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-42004021658983778522008-07-10T19:16:00.002Z2008-07-10T20:39:34.875Z

I've a post in the works, which may appear below this one, on the differences between our watchees. Nick's Standard piece, Mosley's trial by tabloid is the price of free speech is bizarre enough to merit its own (more or less) post. When Saddam Hussein's Iraq invaded the Ayatollah Khomeini's Iran in 1980, Henry Kissinger looked at the two ghoulish combatants and said: "It's a pity they can't

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-50552040355470016372008-07-08T19:12:00.002Z2008-07-08T19:27:48.769Z

This is slightly off-topic, but I've been dying to post this for a while and today is the day that temptation won. With regard to Nick's To use a word they ['liberal' broadcasters] would never use, their chosen careers are “unmanly”. I had a desk with a phone in the newsroom, though I was seldom there. The sight of grown men, and some women, filling in expenses forms, going to the pub, reading

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-50762663394074177232008-07-04T13:59:00.003Z2008-07-05T11:56:18.876Z

No indeed. And he's still writing, twice a week now, over on the Times. 10 days ago he wrote about Mugabe. B2 is ignoring the Yank election process and is thinking about Africa, so I've left that one to him. Hooray! Dave seems to have a regular gig reading the Times archive. His method, if he has one, is to stay away from anniversaries of any sort. Last Saturday was the 94th June 28 since the

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-28341873460064555452008-07-02T17:17:00.003Z2008-07-02T17:56:54.088Z

Well, reader Bubby did ask. Christopher Hitchens: On the waterboard. This came to me via Justin 'Chicken Yoghurt'. It's done the rounds: tehgrauniad; Update From the “No Shit” Department (John Cole gets the best title); David T of Harry's Place and many more no doubt. I did think about blogging this here. It's good to see Hitchens on the right side, and I'm pleased that David T wrote about

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-63311789456310143082008-06-29T10:34:00.002Z2008-06-29T11:15:49.645Z

As commenter Matt pointed out, Nick hasn't been in the Observer since June 8. As Matt also pointed out, he's still writing for the Standard. As has happened before with Nick, I don't disagree with him here. He has two points - Mugabe is a horrible dictator and Nelson Mandela has pretty much universal respect and Mugabe might just listen to him. At least Mugabe's opponents would feel much-needed

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-40704117237016662162008-06-26T17:43:00.003Z2008-06-26T18:41:27.503Z

I'll admit that I haven't bought Standpoint and that I'm probably not going to. This could be a problem here because I can imagine times when print articles have some kind of introductory paragraph added by a sub-ed which the online version omits thereby depriving those in the cheap seats (ie me) with vital context. In the absence of said context, I'm going to have to improvise. Nick Cohen

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-43869123437704335162008-06-22T09:26:00.002Z2008-06-22T10:03:10.240Z

Through the deepening twilight and on far into the night the fierce struggle continued... This new weekly column will be a rummage in the great toy chest that is the Times Archive. I'm not sure if our Dave has a new gig at the Times or if he's just the first writer to survey the Times archive. Why Times reports in 1863 were a shade unreliable/In The Times archive: the Gettysburg battles were

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-63601751873838732312008-06-19T18:15:00.001Z2008-06-19T18:18:13.134Z

Aaro Watch and its valued commentariat indecencus have spent time occasionally chewing over the history and pre-history of various strands of Decency. Now we’ve got the lot in one neat, comprehensive package, courtesy of Tom Griffin. So what do we think? Anything to add, detract, etc?

rioja kidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11445081280366862323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-45593071494483956862008-06-18T20:11:00.004Z2008-06-18T21:27:25.089Z

For a few days now, there's been the stirrings of a post at the back of my mind on where Decents fall out among themselves these days. It was always a strange sort of movement; the 'Senator for Boeing' Society lot being generally Tories, Harry's Place and Marko Attila Hoare using 'Comrades' as unselfconsciously as they drink tea out of a saucer (take that any way you please), Nick Cohen and

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-57598469107153935182008-06-18T19:50:00.004Z2008-06-18T21:47:48.235Z

This isn't really an Aarowatch post, but I think just about all (both?) of you know that Bruschetta Boy is also known as Daniel Davies ('e's no relation to David Davis). I don't know if Dan has spotted that his claim to fame just hit that point of the exponential graph where the y co-ordinate roughly equals infinity. The story starts here. Note the 'shorter' which our man created for Stephen

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-74915852853974777772008-06-17T07:05:00.000Z2008-06-17T07:06:17.762Z

Did he use the Hitler analogy? Yes he did, folks. David Davis is ... Hitler. He's Hitler, can't you see it? Look at his Hitlery face, I ask you guv, what a Hitler! Blood & Treasure, as usual, had the pundosphere pegged on the issue of Davis; he's a mad careerist with lashings of warm Hitler. It is very funny indeed to see Aaro thrashing around in this one; the trouble is that what he wants

Bruschettaboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06462814606739183471noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-29770689700657489692008-06-13T20:09:00.002Z2008-06-13T21:17:12.949Z

First: two apologies. I wrote some of this in my head while cooking my tea, and it's longer than I'd like. Also, I am minded of the story about Einstein submitting some paper to a journal only to have it rejected with comments from the anonymous reviewer which were longer than the paper itself. I am aware that I may be over-analysing here. I'm over-analysing because some of my target for this

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-32779195866280713042008-06-12T13:45:00.003Z2008-06-12T18:52:22.410Z

My American ex-partner used to say that the British media get everything about the USA wrong, and doubtless my commentary here will be no exception to that. I do my best: I try to stick to reportage from the States rather than that filtered through the papers here, and I make no apology for my getting a lot of that from blogs. I haven't followed that much of the primaries. Still, I think Clinton

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-86968817436294312302008-06-10T13:36:00.002Z2008-06-10T13:39:24.640Z

I think we can all sign up to this campaign. Aaro is, of course, not Jewish, but as an "influencer of Jewish life", surely to fuck he's got to rank above Melanie Phillips, hasn't he? Wot a travesty. (btw, readers, have we done this one before? sorry if we have. All this Watching kind of blends into a homogeneous mess after a while).

Bruschettaboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06462814606739183471noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-7100741574890042072008-06-10T08:23:00.002Z2008-06-10T08:28:09.661Z

Q: What's more irritating that people who go on all the time about their petty grievances? A: People who bang on incessantly about their petty grievances about people going on all the time about their petty grievances? (I am sure that someone is just itching to make the hilarious joke in comments which would be possible if one were to continue the recursion in order to indict me for going on

Bruschettaboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06462814606739183471noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-13789905612723013592008-06-09T06:27:00.003Z2008-06-09T07:08:31.706Z

There's a lot to agree with in Nick's latest. He's right that the government has incentivized research in universities at the expense of teaching, and that this isn't necessarily in the public interest. He's also right that the current RAE doesn't work too well and that the proposed employment of metrics in the future may result in some perverse outcomes. Nick being Nick, however, he can't write

Captain Cabernetnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-3569265305103204872008-06-05T07:44:00.002Z2008-06-05T08:05:33.587Z

This one comes under "world of Decency" I think. Can anyone explain the Harry's Place masthead? First, they had Galloway whom they don't like[1]; then they had Blair, whom they did; now there's an Obama poster. Incidentally, Gene has asked "is it fair to say that Barack Obama (assuming he wins the November election and all) will be our [sic] first Jewish President?" Answer: No. Further 'World

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-23825238040649665212008-06-04T14:46:00.002Z2008-06-04T18:45:40.295Z

Update: Don't miss Chardonnary Chap's take on this article, posted below this one due to vagaries of New Blogger. The last but one post rather turned into a contrarian defence of managerialism, more or less by accident - what this blog needs is a rigorous regime of targets for "number of on-topic and minimally coherent posts". What I actually wanted to write it about was Nick's assumption

Bruschettaboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06462814606739183471noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-84501046097407750782008-06-04T12:08:00.005Z2008-06-04T13:46:08.292Z

Being witty and entertaining to an audience of financial services professionals in the Cayman Islands, on the subject of "economic nationalism". Some choice quotes: "By bringing respected and influential journalists such as David Aaronovitch to Cayman we achieve multiple objectives for our membership and the Cayman Islands overall. First, we encourage journalists to take a fresh look at who we

Bruschettaboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06462814606739183471noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-88998717838716410832008-06-04T05:26:00.002Z2008-06-04T17:31:31.259Z

Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode, The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road. A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire, And after him the parson ran, the sexton and the squire; A merry road, a mazy road, and such as we did tread The night we went to Birmingham by way of Beachy Head. I knew no harm of Bonaparte and plenty of the Squire, And

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-2630954282102503522008-06-03T08:36:00.001Z2008-06-03T08:39:34.385Z

It appears that Harry Fletcher of the probation officers' union, Nick's usual source for matters loranorderical, isn't picking up the phone this week. And so he must move on to other sources; in this case, the pile of "A Touch of Frost" DVDs next to the telly. I am not even sure that the "do it by the book" politician-boss is actually a particularly uniquely British figure, but that's by the by

Bruschettaboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06462814606739183471noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-90513571927187411712008-05-29T16:38:00.002Z2008-05-29T17:55:16.231Z

As spotted in the comments, new political magazine Standpoint has come out. Standpoint has already tested my vocabulary. I need a better description than "unremittingly dire". But it's at least that.[1] Standpoint’s core mission is to celebrate our civilization, its arts and its values – in particular democracy, debate and freedom of speech – at a time when they are under threat. Standpoint is

Chardonnay Chaphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01275819795032251978noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12803252.post-87749066166325952232008-05-28T08:37:00.003Z2008-05-28T17:02:55.104Z

The Guardian has an article attacking the Daily Telegraph for hosting an anti-immigrant blog run by a BNP member. Surely it can only be a matter of hours (or minutes) before a post appears on HP Sauce claiming hypocrisy on the grounds that CiF has published Inayat Bunglawala? (Or maybe this will feature in the next Nick Cohen column?) UPDATE: Get in! 5 hours and 54 minutes. For my next trick ..

Captain Cabernetnoreply@blogger.com