Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category
Doctrinaire aggression vs physical aggression
Wole Soyinka: On origins of religious strife… In Mr. Soyinka’s view, the origins of the current phase of the world’s religious strife—including all of the bloodshed in Nigeria—lie with Ayatollah Khomeini and his fatwa against Salman Rushdie, in 1989. “It all began when he assumed the power of life and death over the life of […]
More unintended consequences?
How’s this for taking things a leetle bit too far… (It makes a good point though.) Did the US Supreme Court consider that by ruling the government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections (on the basis that it’s a ‘free speech’ right!) that it was, in effect, giving corporations ‘human rights’? […]
Talking with Dave: thoughts about media blur
I’m part way through an online conversation with Dave, who I like, about hyperbolic opinion pieces masquerading as news (what I call the Glenn Beck/Fox News effect). We’re discussing Dave’s frustration with the “blur” between news and opinion. Dave said: I wouldn’t mind if the media did genuinely report as an opinion piece. At least […]
Did they jump or were they pushed?
Heads must roll… Fallout from last week’s blinding flash of the obvious, which I described as classic ‘provider capture’. Kneecapper and straightshooter Dame Margaret Bazley found that the Legal Services Agency was being routinely rorted by lawyers and that lawyers were effectively asserting control over the legal aid system. Four resign over scathing legal aid […]
A loss of moral authority
There is added moral authority when someone who hasn’t had to struggle sounds a call to help those less privileged. Beyond mere noblesse-oblige, Teddy Kennedy became a leading voice of ‘liberal’ ideology, with an emphasis on equality and innate justice best expressed in the civil rights movement of the 1960s — but applied far wider […]
How to have a FAIR argument
For a number of years I worked as a political reporter at Parliament Buildings in Wellington (New Zealand). During my time in that highly competitive pressure-cooker environment I learned a lot about truth, perception, political ‘reality’, and human nature. I hope I also learned to be careful with what I say. While I was in […]
