An open letter to David Cameron
An open letter by Heydon Prowse, who filmed the secret video of Alan Duncan that got him fired from the Tory front bench.
——
Dear David,
Well done for demoting Alan. As head of the Tory PR machine – sorry I mean party – you have demonstrated real leadership. Because you can’t just have MPs going around speaking their real minds all the time, can you Dave, or the Tories would never get elected.
Of course Alan was not the person to lead expenses reform in the Tory party, but you knew his views. Much more importantly, the man lacks the basic credential needed to be a member of your inner circle – sufficient guile to successfully deceive people. Perhaps his PR people should go too. After all, it was their idea to say to the press that Alan would like to have a drink with me to show that he really was a jolly good sport after he had initially threatened to set the police on us for the free gardening we gave him. Backfired that one eh?
Much better to have experienced lobbyists and public relations executives ‘representing’ the people, like George Eustice, your former press secretary who’ll be standing in Camborne and Redruth in Cornwall at the next election, or Priti Patel, director of PR firm Weber Shandwick, which represents hedge funds and investment banks, who is standing in the constituency of Witham. Eh wot?!
Thank god you didn’t fire Alan ages ago when it emerged that while shadow business secretary with responsibility for energy policy, his private office was funded by the decidedly dodgy oil company Vitol, or people might have thought you were actually serious about reform. I for one feel completely reassured of your inclination to represent the interests of a tiny financial elite, rather than the hard working people of Britain.
Yes – with tycoons and financiers flocking to you with their totally expectation free donations and your shadow ministers hobnobbing around the Med on the yachts of Russian oligarchs, you’re fast becoming Blair mark II, which is exactly what the country needs. Here’s hoping you win the next election so that you can disappoint us all as profoundly as he did. Hurrah!
Hope you feel rested enough after your three month summer holiday for your return to parliament in October.
All the best going forward,
Heydon Prowse
Sun apologises again over fake ‘hit list’
The Sun Newspaper published a small apology yesterday, tucked away somewhere in the paper. It read:
OUR story on January 7 about a ‘hit list’ of top British Jews on the website Ummah.com was based on claims by Glen Jenvey who last week confessed to duping several newspapers and Tory MP Patrick Mercer by fabricating stories about Islamic fundamentalism.
Following Mr Jenvey’s confession, we apologise to Ummah.com for the article which we now accept was inaccurate.
The apology was most likely forced by the Press Complaints Commission and followed another half-apology by the Sun last week.
As Liberal Conspiracy has pointed out in the past, the Sun has yet to apologise to Tim Ireland from Bloggerheads, who took apart the story and faced months of abuse and stalking while doing so.
The Media Guardian quoted Sajid Pandore from Ummah.com:
I would like to pay tribute to two bloggers, Tim Ireland and Richard Bartholomew that made the discovery that it was Glen Jenvey who made the comments themselves and also the Press Complaints Commission for investigating.
Richard Bartholomew adds:
Actually, Tim made the discovery and took the heat – I just did some follow-up and background stuff. The above quote will doubtless be used by Dominic Wightman, a former associate of Jenvey who tried to manipulate Tim and me (and to some extent succeeded) into writing about a third person that Wightman had a grudge against. When Wightman’s deception came to light, he defended himself by suggesting that because Sajid had helped us with tracking some IP addresses, Tim (and to a lesser extent, me) were colluding with Islamic extremists as part of a “Black Red Alliance”.
Septicisle also comments:
The whole incident is though instructive of how the tabloids deal with such complaints. Even when an article which appeared on tje front page and made such startling accusations and claims is shown to have been completely inaccurate, the only thing the paper has had to do in any form of reparation is publish the pathetic “clarification” at the top of this post, which was printed in the paper itself on page 12. Any casual reader would think that the Sun was the victim of Jenvey as much as Ummah.com was, when this could not be further from the actuality.
Watch: Yes Men spoof newspaper on climate
The Associated Press reports:
A day before a U.N. summit on climate change, an activist prankster group distributed copies of a fake newspaper mimicking the New York Post to draw attention to global warming. The front-page story in the newspaper parody Monday warned of “massive climate catastrophes” and “public health disasters.”
Volunteers for The Yes Men distributed the free parody outside busy commuter hubs in Manhattan and Brooklyn, including one of the city’s main train stations, Penn Station.
They also launched a website here.
New Statesman redesigns and adds columnists
The New Statesman magazine is introducing new columnists to its stable and giving the magazine and website a new look and feel.
It will also have a greater focus on photography with the appointment of the New Statesman’s first ever picture editor.
New columnists include the novelist Will Self on strange social phenomena and high street food; the comedian Mark Watson on ethical dilemmas; David Blanchflower on economics; Phillip ‘Red Toryism’ Blond on political ideas.
Blanchflower is a former member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England, and professor of economics at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire.
John Gray has been appointed lead book reviewer. Mehdi Hasan is now senior editor (politics) and will be its polemicist, in print and online.
Michael Hodges will write a weekly column on class; historian Dominic Sandbrook will explore counterfactual history; and the writer/activists Mark Lynas, Sophie Elmhirst and Bibi van der Zee will write columns on green issues, the environment and direct action.
They join the established team of columnists: John Pilger (World Citizen), James Macintyre (Politics), Peter Wilby (First Thoughts), Hunter Davies (The Fan), Nicholas Lezard (Down and Out in London), Gideon Donald (Preparing for Power), Ryan Gilbey (film), Rachel Cooke (television), Antonia Quirke (radio), Jude Rogers (pop music), Andrew Billen (theatre) and Leo Robson (fiction).
Rebecca McClelland has been appointed as picture editor. She joins from Wallpaper magazine and was previously picture director with the Sunday Times and ES magazines.
Jason Cowley, editor, says:
We are independent of all political parties and beholden to no one individual or group. But we will continue to campaign for fairness and greater equality, to challenge and provoke as well as amuse and entertain. We shall remain at the forefront of political commentary and analysis; on the staff we have the best two young political journalists in Britain, Mehdi Hasan and James Macintyre.
…
We are, also, in the process of a major expansion of our online operation. Newstatesman.com has been stylishly redesigned and we have launched our popular blogs, Free Speech. Over the next few months, we will be rolling out a series of exciting digital projects which will utterly transform our online presence as the New Statesman seeks to become the world’s leading progressive voice.
A press release stated it will, “remain left-of-centre in politics and true to its radical heritage, but will be more nuanced in tone, more plural and sceptical.”
Third of Tory voters unconvinced by Tories
David Cameron still has not managed to convince a majority of the country that he is the right man to lead the country.
A Populus poll of voters for The Times yesterday found that almost a third of Tory supporters were voting Conservative purely to remove Labour rather than out of enthusiasm for the Conservatives.
It not only illustrates the lack of enthusiasm for David Cameron, but also for Gordon Brown personally. Polls widely show that he remains more unpopular than the party.
A Populus poll from yesterday also showed that Tory emphasis on cutting spending along wasn’t popular with the public.
38% of voters said they preferred that the deficit was dealt with a “roughly equal split between tax increases and cuts in public spending”.
In contrast, just 21% wanted deficit reductions purely through a fall in public spending, with no tax increases.
Gordon Brown’s poll ratings in freefall
The Times reports today from a Populus poll showing that voters across the country are turned off by Gordon Brown.
39% of voters see David Cameron as lightweight and 56% as substantial. By contrast, 59% regard Mr Brown as lightweight and 38% as substantial.
Mr Cameron also wins the decisive/dithering question, by 69% to 27%. By contrast, 67% see Mr Brown as dithering, and 30% as decisive.
Cameron: 73% see him as likeable / 24% as unlikeable. 72% charismatic / 24% dull.
Brown: 56% view him as unlikeable and just 40% likeable. 86% see him as dull, just 12% as charismatic.
Cameron: 57% believe that he says what he thinks people want to hear / 40% who think that he means what he says.
Brown: 70% to 27% for Mr Brown.
In the personality and credibility stakes, Brown loses massively.
Labour supporters less likely to vote
Mike Smithson at Political Betting highlights some crucial stats about Labour voters – they are dispirited and less likly to vote compared to likely Conservative voters.
And that too by a significant margin.
He adds:
In previous elections Labour has benefited that in seats where it mattered, the marginals, it found it easier to get its people out. Where it doesn’t matter, in Tory or Labour strongholds, then supporters have been much less motivated to vote – one of the big drivers behind the the seat calculations and a key reason why the system seems to work against the Tories.
Punished by Tories ‘for challenging extremism’
The former Conservative MEP Edward McMillan-Scott today wrote of his shock of being expelled from the party for ‘challenging extremism’.
He said in the Guardian today:
Extreme right parties like the BNP did well in June’s Euro-elections in 13 out of the EU’s 27 countries. But my stand was against Kaminski, who negotiated the deal with Cameron and used it to make his controversial Polish party respectable. This represents the rise of disguised extremism – the widespread “entryism” into mainstream parties that must be stopped.
He was barred from discussing Polish MEP Michal Kaminski on BBC Radio this morning.
He outlined his criticism of Kaminski:
A storm erupted over Kaminski’s use of the antisemitic term “Poland for the Poles”, although he denies saying it, and the Observer gave details of his opposition to an apololgy for the notorious wartime Jedwabne pogrom. His role as leader of the ECR – compensation for losing the vice-presidency – led to outrage from rabbis in Poland, France and the UK .
His “Go home foreign workers” stunt and remarks about Poland’s EU partners are a matter of record, as anyone handy with Google Translate can discover. He denied being homophobic but the BBC broadcast a clip from Polish TV using the term “faggots”. Even the interviewer protests, but Kaminski repeats it: “What should I say, they are faggots [pedaly].” All this sits uneasily with Cameron’s “liberal conservatism”.
A row has been going on over Kaminski for a while, which became especially ferocious when the New Statesman’s James Macintyre reported that Jewish leaders across Europe had condemned David Cameron for his alliances across Europe.
On Tuesday the Left Foot Forward blog reported that Angela Merkel’s CDU party had recalled its London representative Thomas Stehling to Germany because of David Cameron’s decision to withdraw from the European People’s Party.
In May, the Guardian reported that, “Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany appeared to threaten to withhold cooperation from the Conservatives” while Pöttering “angrily described Cameron as untrustworthy.”
Brixton launches its own local currency
London’s Brixton has become the first urban town to launch its own local currency. The B£ will be unveiled at Brixton Town Hall tonight, the fourth complementary currency to emerge in the UK since the launch of the Totnes pound in 2007.
The Brixton Pound (B£) will support local shops, encourage local trade and production and keep money working for Brixton for longer.
It follows hot on the heels of the Stroud ‘teasle’ launched on 12th September 2009, and rumours that Canterbury may also issue its own currency.
Because the B£ can’t leave the area, nor be ‘banked’ to earn interest, customers using it know they will be putting money in to circulation, supporting local shops and jobs.
The aim of the scheme is to maintain the diversity of the Brixton high street and preventing it becoming just another ‘clone town’ in the face of the credit crunch and fierce competition from chain stores.
Josh Ryan-Collins, expert in local currencies at nef (the new economics foundation) and one of the team who has helped to develop the B£, says:
The Brixton Pound is a community currency that will enable local people to vote with their wallets for a strong and diverse Brixton economy. If you spend with a large chain retailer, over 80 per cent of your money leaves the area almost immediately. With the B£ we know that our money will stay working for Brixton. This puts Brixton at the heart of a powerful local renaissance that is fast gathering pace around the world.
So far:
• 60 Brixton businesses and 700 local people had signed up to the currency
• Over £10,000 pounds had been pledged to be converted in to B£s
• Morleys of Brixton, a family owned high street department store, will issue B£s and accept B£s at 20 of its tills
Each of the new Brixton notes will commemorate a local hero, voted on by the people of Brixton and celebrating the diversity of the South London suburb:
• B£1 – Olive Morris, a radical political activist and community organiser who established the Brixton Black Women’s Group, and played a pivotal role in the squatters’ rights campaigns of the 1970s; Olive was born in Jamaica in 1952 and moved with her family to Britain aged 9. She was a Brixton resident from 1961-1975 and died at the age of 27 from cancer
• B£5 – James Lovelock, the independent scientist and environmentalist who, whilst working for NASA, first developed the ‘Gaia’ theory, that the earth is in a delicate but dynamic steady-state that human activity is disturbing, in particular through global warming. James was a Brixton resident from 1925-1933
• B£10 – C L R James, the Trinidadian journalist, historian, socialist thinker and anti-colonialist who chose to spend his final years on the ‘front line’ of Brixton
• B£20 – Vincent Van Gogh, who moved to Brixton aged 20, reportedly returning to Holland a changed man, having seen first hand, the impacts of poverty on his daily walk from Brixton to Covent Garden
The B£ team hope that the currency will mirror the success of a growing number of local currencies around the world that are proving that local home-grown solutions are powerful antidotes to the corrosive impacts of big-chain retailers and profit-hungry banks that have become ‘too big to fail’.
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Taken from a press release
Power2010 campaign launches today
A new campaign hoping to inspire collective action to ensure the next Parliament makes a commitment to fix our political system launches today.
Power2010, formed from the 2006 Power Inquiry, will use mass campaign tactics and voting to identify the five changes to the UK political system the public most want to see.
Between now and next spring, they aim to build a nationwide movement for changing politics that will see publicly-backed priorities such as Party funding and fairer voting put directly to every candidate standing in the General Election.
Helena Kennedy QC, Chair of Power2010, and of the original Power Inquiry, said:
What is different about Power2010 is that – apart from changing politics – there is no agenda. We’re not asking the public to back POWER2010’s calls. We’re asking the public to create them. From fairer voting, cleaner funding, protecting privacy to the right to ‘sack’ MPs, it will be the public that decides what the next Parliament must do.
People have not forgotten how angry they were at finding out their taxes were paying for moats, dry rot and second homes. But whilst public confidence is at an all time low, the expenses scandal is only a symptom of a wider problem.
According to organisers, from today the campaign moves into 5 distinct phases:
1. The public and organisations submit their ideas for fixing politics via the website by Thursday 5 November
2. Power2010 will bring together citizens from across the UK to decide the shortlist of reforms to go to the public vote
3. On November 18th – the day of the Queen’s Speech – public voting begins.
4. The voting ends at midnight on 31st January. The five top reforms voted by the public are announced in February 2010 – creating the Power2010 Pledge
5. In the months to the General Election every candidate is pressed to back the Power2010 Pledge at hustings, via email, letters and the media.
Sign up here: http://www.power2010.org.uk
BNP ‘hijacking’ Welsh nationalist hero
Wales News reports today:
The British National Party has been accused of hijacking the legend of Owain Glyndwr by printing T-shirts bearing the image of the historic Welsh figure.
Clothing depicting the last native Prince of Wales are on sale through the BNP’s merchandising website Excalibur, accompanied by the slogan, “British By Birth, Welsh by the Grace of God” across the front.
…
Glyndwr, who led the historic uprising against the English rule of Wales, was proclaimed the last native Prince of Wales on September 16, 1400.
In response, Rumbold at Pickled Politics writes:
Given that Owain Glyndr was opposed to English rule in Wales, will the BNP now support Welsh independence? The BNP’s use of the Welsh prince as a hero makes about as much sense as the BNP praising Nehru.
It is unclear what the BNP’s take on history is. At times it appears to be a very English nationalism, at other times the focus is on ’shared’ British or European heritage. Some BNPers are very Christian, others worship Norse gods. I don’t think they have a unified view of history beyond the notion that non-whites are foreigners. They struggle to reconcile a British nationalism based on racial purity with the fact that most Britons are of immigrant stock in some shape or form.
Libdems launch campaign against airbrushing
The Liberal Democrats launched an online campaign yesterday encouraging people to report adverts featuring heavily airbrushed images of women to advertising watchdogs.
The online campaign at www.realwomen.org.uk/takeaction is encouraging people to complain to the Advertising Standards Agency and the Committee of Advertising Practice about adverts which portray unrealistic and unhealthy body images.
The campaign also seeks a ban on adverts aimed at under-16s using digital retouching to portray unrealistic body images
Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson, who chairs the party’s working group on women’s policy, said:
Adverts that feature heavily retouched images of perfect skin, perfect hair and perfect figures mean that women and girls increasingly feel that nothing less than perfect will do.
Advertisers should be honest and upfront about the extent of airbrushing that goes on. It is frankly dishonest to advertise an anti-wrinkle cream and then airbrush out all of the wrinkles in the ad. And it is simply irresponsible to take already underweight women and then slice off pieces of their thighs or hips in the computer suite.
Consumers should have as much information as possible and children should have the space to develop their self-esteem without constantly being bombarded with a narrow range of manipulated images that promote conformity.
After the Libdems earlier called for digital retouching to be banned in adverts targeted at children, and clearly indicated in adverts aimed at adults, a spokesperson for the Advertising Standards Authority said digital retouching (airbrushing) was not an issue it received many complaints about.
But he added that the ASA would respond to complaints which were drawn to its attention.
Hammond caught out while rubbishing economy
The shadow chancellor Secretary to the Treasury, Tory MP Phil Hammond was caught out over views that the UK economy was about to lose its credit rating.
He said on BBC Newsnight last night:
We need to send a clear signal to the markets. Two of the credit rating agencies have already warned us that the government’s triple A credit rating will be at risk if the next government does not show greater determination than this government has so far demonstrated.
See on BBC iPlayer (14m 50secs in).
But one of the biggest credit ratings agencies, Moodys, today contradicted him:
The UK and Spain are unlikely to lose their top credit ratings even after being ’severely hit’ by the global economic crisis, Moody’s Investor Service said.
“Germany and France, other Aaa-rated countries which had been more affected by the crisis than Moody’s expected, remain ‘resistant,’ Pierre Cailleteau, managing director of sovereign risk at the ratings company, said in a statement today. The U.S. doesn’t face any ‘downward rating pressure’ in the next few years even as its balance sheet expands, Moody’s said.
…
‘Almost all aaa-rated sovereigns have been hit more severely by the global downturn than we expected earlier this year,’ Moody’s said. ‘Nevertheless, all Aaa countries now have stable outlooks, indicating that we do not expect rating downgrades over the near term.’
via Though Cowards Flinch
Study: NHS improves hugely under Labour
A new study by the British Medical Journal shows that the NHS has improved massively since 1997.
It indicates that reforms have decreased waiting times and increased equality of services.
The report aimed to determine, “whether observable changes in waiting times occurred for certain key elective procedures” since 1997,
and analysed the “distribution of those changes between socioeconomic groups as an indicator of equity”.
The results, from surveying over 400,000 patients indicated that:
Mean and median waiting times rose initially and then fell steadily over time. By 2007 variation in waiting times across the population tended to be lower. In 1997 waiting times and deprivation tended to be positively related.
By 2007 the relation between deprivation and waiting time was less pronounced, and, in some cases, patients from the most deprived fifth were waiting less time than patients from the most advantaged fifth.
The study concluded that:
Between 1997 and 2007 waiting times for patients having elective hip replacement, knee replacement, and cataract repair in England went down and the variation in waiting times for those procedures across socioeconomic groups was reduced.
Many people feared that the government’s NHS reforms would lead to inequity, but inequity with respect to waiting times did not increase; if anything, it decreased. Although proving that the later stages of those reforms, which included patient choice, provider competition, and expanded capacity, was a catalyst for improvements in equity is impossible, the data show that these reforms, at a minimum, did not harm equity.
More information on this BMJ page.
Bristol Tory says gay funding ‘outrageous’
The leader of Bristol’s Tories, Richard Eddy, has said that a Big Lottery Fund award to tackle homophobia was “outrageous” and proof that money was being awarded to reflect “politically correct” lobbies favoured by Labour.
A lottery grant of almost £400,000 was awarded to a Bristol youth group, Reach. It will form a youth group to be involved in decision-making processes that affect lesbian, gay and bisexual young people through consultation with agencies around Bristol, North Somerset, South Gloucestershire and Bath & North East Somerset.
But Mr Eddy, who heads the opposition Conservative group on the city council, told the Bristol Evening Post:
I think this is a mistaken and misguided, outrageous waste of money.
Sadly, it seems to be further confirmation that the Big Lottery has long since ceased to impartially distribute lottery cash to worthwhile and respected causes, instead it seems obliged to dole out punters’ money to a raft of politically correct lobbies which clearly sit within the Labour Government’s priority.
Right on cue, a pressure group called The Campaign Against Political Correctness issued a statement saying:
I’m sure people in the community would rather have funding that would benefit all. Often singling out groups of people for special treatment creates more problems than it solves. Funding that would go to a group involving all people would be more inclusive.
The full story is here.
A few years ago Mr Eddy had been condemned for trying to have a golliwog as the office mascot. At the time he said it was “a harmless joke”.
A Facebook Group condemning the Bristol Tory has already attracted over 500 members.
Dorries opposes equal lesbian birth rights
It was reported today by the BBC that women in same-sex relationships can now register both their names on the birth certificate of a child conceived as a result of fertility treatment.
But prominent Tories were not happy. Nadine Dorries told the BBC:
If we want to build a stable society, a mother and father and children works as the best model.
We should be striving towards repairing and reinforcing marriage. I think this move sends out the exact opposite message.
The modern face of the progressive and compassionate Tory party no doubt.
According to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, there were 728 lesbians who underwent in vitro fertilisation (IVF) between 1999 and 2006.
The BBC also reports that: “Also, sperm donors will continue to be able to opt in or out of having their name on the birth certificate, but if both mothers wish to have their name on the document, the donor cannot be registered in that way.”
Guidelines: Reporting the TaxPayers’ Alliance
The Other Taxpayers’ Alliance has come up with an indispensable guidelines for the media on whether they should be using the TaxPayers’ Alliance as rent-a-quotes.
The guidelines feature essential top 5 reporting tips and a handy flowchart to help them plan their story. It also features examples of bad research by the TPA.
The top 5 tips
1. Give context
The TaxPayers’ Alliance is a right-wing pressure group – and so should be described as a ‘right-wing pressure group’. Additional adjectives may be used at your discretion.
2. Use initiative
When presented with a TPA press release, aim to rewrite at least half of it. Try getting a second opinion. Or failing that, Google.
3. Add perspective
The TPA calls itself a ‘grassroots alliance’ of ‘ordinary taxpayers’. But it doesn’t have a membership – just a free-to-join mailing list of 20,000, which represents 0.04% of taxpayers. This compares with, say, the 1.3 million taxpayers who are members of the public sector trade union, Unison.
4. Name names
‘Ordinary taxpayers’ who support the TPA include: Sir Tom Cowie (Life President, Arriva), Sir Rocco Forte (Chairman, Rocco Forte Hotels), Peter Hargreaves (CEO, Hargreaves Lansdown), Malcolm H.D. McAlpine, (Director, Sir Robert McAlpine), Stuart Wheeler (Chairman, IG Group), and Lords Salisbury, Pearson, Derwent, Hodgson, Chadlington, Kalms and Vinson.
5. Investigate
Who funds the TaxPayers’ Alliance? Why won’t it tell us – or even reveal its income?
You can download the short document from here.
Published by the Other Taxpayers’ Alliance.
Polling over summer favours Tories by 15%
The Conservative party have a 17% lead in polls according to an Ipsos-Mori poll out in Sunday’s Observer.
The Tories stand at 43%, while Labour is at 26% and Libdems at 17%.
The Tory lead has roughly stabilised to around 15% with no real change over the entire summer, according to the head of Ipsos-Mori.
In a short analysis piece on their website, Sir Robert Worcester, founder of Mori, says:
In rainy July the eight published polls from six different polling organisations, fieldwork starting the 10th and ending the 30th July, averaged Conservatives 40.3%, Labour 25.1%, Liberal Democrats 19.3% and others combined, 15.4%.
Although the media made something of a meal of a July low of 38% for the Tories (Populus/The Times), which gave them a lead of just twelve percentage points, all eight were within the “standard” margin of error +/-3% of 40.3%. All eight polls had Labour at 25.1% (+-/3%), all eight had the Liberal Democrats at 19.3% and all eight had the others combined at +/-3% around 15.4%.
He adds that since the beginning of the year over 100,000 people have been questioned in 73 polls.
What does that say about the state of British politics?
First, since the beginning of the year, the monthly averages have shown that 42%/43% for the Tories in the spring has been sustained. The miserable 23% for Labour in May and June has recovered somewhat, except for a few numbers in the high 30s, and is now at 25%/26%.
However, the “core vote for Labour” of 30%, breached in the 1983 Election with 28.4% voting for Michael Foot as Leader of the Labour Party (the least popular leader in the polling history, with the least popular policies in polling history and the least well organised campaign in living memory), suggests that the current sustained level of Labour’s low level of support, not scoring any figure of 30% or above since early April, must make for dismal reading at Number 10 with the election forecasted to be on 6th May 2010.
A six-month trend picture is published here (PDF), covering several polling organisations.
Baltimore Mayor hits back at Grayling over ‘Wire’
The Mayor of Baltimore has hit back at Tory MP Chris Grayling over comparing parts of Britain to The Wire.
In a statement posted to her website, Sheila Dixon said Baltimore had a per capita homicide rate “a fraction of that in the popular UK television show Midsomer Murders.”
The statement read:
Fellow citizens
This week I was alerted to a speech made by a Member of the British Parliament, a Mr Chris Grayling, who suggested his country should fear becoming like our city of Baltimore as portrayed in the HBO series, The Wire. We all watched The Wire and while it was sometimes a heart-breaking reflection of reality, it was in the main, merely entertaining fiction.
The television show failed to reflect the best we have in this city, our sense of community, our hospitality and our proud history and culture. To present a television show as the real Baltimore is to perpetuate a fiction that dishonours our city. It is as pointless as boasting that Baltimore has a per capita homicide rate a fraction of that in the popular UK television show Midsomer Murders.
The Baltimore Police Department is working hard to protect the people of this city and it should be remembered that The Wire was just a television show. As this video shows, there is so much more to Baltimore than The Wire.
She links to a website with a full count of homicides in Midsomer Murders.
Chris Grayling has yet to respond.
Update: It’s a fake. But this accompanying video is pretty funny though.
And Chris Grayling is still wrong.
Another update, in response to Iain Dale
There never was a press release to the story.
I heard about it on Twitter and passed it along to post up on the site.
The sanctimonious attitude of Dale and Fawkes is funny – I suppose they’ve never linked to a website with a comment.
http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2009/08/extent-of-government-funded-lobbying.html
http://order-order.com/2009/08/04/think-tanks-on-the-taxpayer/
Dale – I know you’re still pissed off we forced you to apologise to Tom Watson for libelling him, but this really is quite amusingly sad.
Want to hear Tony Blair speak?
Fans of former prime minister Tony Blair should be delighted to hear he’s giving a series of seminars and speeches in London over the coming months.
Organised by the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, in association with DFID, Islamic Relief, WorldVision and Oxfam, they will cover the subject theme: ‘New Perspectives on Faith and Development’.
A press release states:
Our goal is to explore the vital role that faith can play in all aspects of international development. The role of faith in the context of development is complex – it is often hugely positive, but it can also be deeply problematic. The speakers will represent a variety of faith and secular perspectives, and each seminar will be an honest and open discussion about the role of faith and the contribution of the faith communities to development.
I’m sure you’ll agree Tony Blair has much to teach others on how faith (and foreign policy?) can bring communities together.
Here are the dates and topics
Monday 7 September
Opening keynote address from the Rt Hon Tony Blair on Why Faith Matters for Development.
Wednesday 30
September Faith in the Marketplace?
Tuesday 6 October
Poverty & Conflict: Faith as a Solution or Cause?
Tuesday 20 October
Health and Education- Where Faith Fits?
Wednesday 4 November
Towards a Sustainable Environment: What Can Faith Teach Us?
Thursday 12 November
Closing keynote address from The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams.
You can request a space by emailing by the 2nd of September 2009 to register your interest, stating which seminars you would like to attend.
The location of the seminars will be in a central London location, but the exact location cannot be revealed until 24 hours before the first event. Top secret stuff.
You can read articles through the front page, via Twitter or rss feeds.
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» Last night’s Labour hustings: will it get interesting or turn to torture?
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» The Labour leadership’s token contender.. and it’s not Diane Abbott
» In defence of these fraternal nominations
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