Blogoir

Today the latest edition of DIPLOMAT magazine arrived.

I opened it to find an article written by me which I could not remember writing(!). So I read it with much enjoyment and appreciation.

Check it out. It describes my attempts as an argumentative young diplomat to persuade the Embassy in Belgrade in 1983/84 that the then Yugoslavia was possibly heading for a breakdown, with unfathomable consequences. To no avail.

Which prompted me at the time to write my legendary MTS, Non-MTS paper - as per one of my very first blog postings here.

My DIPLOMAT article describes what happened next:

I left the post in 1984. Back at HQ I went along to Personnel to discuss my future. ‘You are getting a reputation for being argumentative,’ said the frumpy HR lady. ‘Wouldn’t you argue if you saw disaster looming but everyone else ignored it?’ I replied in some exasperation.

‘See, you’re arguing again,’ came the smug response.

I still remember this conversation so vividly, not least the supercilious but unimaginative female on the other side of the table. I pointed out to her that it had been annoying dealing with senior Embassy colleagues who instructed me to go out and talk to Yugoslav dissidents and get their devasting observations on the fecklessness of the Yugo-communists, but then could not spell when they wrote afterwards that these people were 'obviously dissaffected'.

"I find that hard to believe", she sniffed.

Pshaw.

And so I moved onto the Air Services Desk and then FCO Speechwriting. The Cold War ended. A mere 300 weeks or so after I left Belgrade, Yugoslavia indeed collapsed into appalling violence and ghastly war crimes. Huge British and international resources were poured in to help stop the fighting and pay for post-conflict reconstruction.

Yes, I had been argumentative. I had even been right. What I see now, with the benefit of much more experience, was that I had not been convincing.

Not that it would have made much difference had I been convincing. Finance Ministries don’t want to adjust their plans to warnings of disaster. They prefer to ignore the problem and instead pay out reluctantly as and when disaster creates real problems, which the taxpayer is prepared to fund to clean up.

In Yugoslavia’s case, this was far more expensive than the cost of investing in diplomatic initiatives to bribe the reckless Yugoslavs into calming down.

What are feisty young Chinese or Indian diplomats now drafting in their European Embassies? Maybe a paper entitled ‘The eurozone: MTS, or non-MTS?’

Will they be allowed to send it back to HQ?

Read the whole thing.

Christopher Myers, the newly appointed 'Special Adviser' to Foreign Secretary William Hague, has resigned amidst a gush of crass innuendo from Guido and others re a possible homosexual relationship between Hague and Myers. 

Willaim Hague's statement on the issue has dignity and barely concealed anger - one of the most remarkable (and frank) things ever said by any Foreign Minister anywhere?

Iain Dale is upset, somehow assuming that this a bleak day for blogging and that 'political blogging' as such is diminished by this episode:

For those who doubt it, they forget (probably conveniently) that I spoke out against the bloggers who accused Gordon Brown of having mental problems. I freely admit that I don't get it right all the time, but when I get it wrong big time I try to hold my hands up and apologise.

I hope that happens in this case. The fact that Guido Fawkes has printed the Hague statement with no added comment indicates a growing realisation (I hope) that he called this one wrong.

I am afraid that all of us who blog have been sullied by this experience, even though only one blog was making the insinuations. I said on Radio 4's PM that there was part of me tonight that is ashamed to call myself a political blogger this evening, and I meant it. That may sound a bit holier than thou, but it is how I feel.

A somewhat self-absorbed and self-indulgent view? Why should he think that 'all of us who blog' have been sullied by this experience?

I don't.

Do journalists for serious newspapers feel 'sullied' by the ravings of tabloids? No.

None of this would have happened had Mr Myers not been given a unique and influentual role at the heart of UK foreign policy work. William Hague in his statement defended the appointment of Mr Myers thus:

Christopher Myers has demonstrated commitment and political talent over the last eighteen months. He is easily qualified for the job he holds.

The fact remains that there is not a whisker of evident benefit coming to taxpayers from this appointment. Even if (as some have wondered) Mr Myers is qualified for the job of an FCO Special Adviser, the job (in my view) should not exist in the first place at a time of such a squeeze on public finances.

Guido looks to have blown it on this one, but he is merely the latest and noisiest exponent of a fine tradition of political muckrakers.

See eg this from Zoe Archer, another story of people supposedly sharing a room:

... 18th century scandal rags gave readers plenty of outrageous behavior. Consider, for example Mrs. Crackenthorpe reporting on:

...Madam Slender-sense, who is lately fallen ill of a swelling she receiv'd by a slip the last ball night. Some are so rude as to say that Beau Garsoon, the French dancing master, was the occasion of it; and Mrs. Manlove, who generally searches into the bottom of such an affair, solemnly protests she saw them go up one pair of stairs together. What they did there, she can't tell, but the lady has been ailing ever since.

There was even a European angle:

... the French exile libellistes who flocked to London to publish scandalous or sexually salacious pamphlets in the hope of extorting lavish suppression fees. These ‘smut-mongering’ pamphleteers have become prominent figures in the recent historiography of the French revolution, with many historians contending that their ‘desacralizing’ and frequently pornographic publications sapped the foundations of the monarchy.

Not a bleak day for anything.

Just the unruly and sometimes downright unpleasant din of our hard-won freedom to lambast our leaders, hard at work.

Update: Guido apparently has replied himself on Iain's blog. Scroll down through the comments:

If ever there was a time for our leaders not only to behave with propriety, but to be seem to behave with propriety, this is it. It is disappointing to watch you climb on a moral high horse and go in the wrong direction...

Sigh.

Another thoughtful and intelligent website to read: Big Questions Online.

Try this one by Susan Jacoby:

When my friend saw one of her favorite young Afghan-American women — a high school senior — weeping in the dining room, she asked what was wrong. “Oh, madam professor,” the girl replied, “my father has arranged for me to meet my future husband. He is 40 years old, and the wedding will take place in six months. I wanted so much to go to college, and this will not be permitted.”

My friend replied gently, “You know, Yasmin, you don’t have to marry anyone in this country because your parents say so. There are organizations to help girls like you think these things through. There are college scholarships. I can give you the names of people to talk to.” Another resident of this community sharply reproved my friend, saying, “We have no right to interfere with her culture, her religion, her family,”

Wrong. This type of “interference” — telling a troubled young woman that she has choices other than an arranged marriage — is exactly what a true liberal ought to be doing. The idea that someone should ignore the tears of a 17-year-old who says she is being pushed to give up her education is utterly perverse.

Maybe I need an iPad to keep track of everything without sitting in front of the PC all day?

Here is the full text of President Obama's speech (in fact TV address) on Iraq/Afghanistan.

Conservative-minded commentators in the USA give it mixed reviews (of course). Sample a few over at the Corner.

Ignoring - as far as one can - the substance, what about Technique?

First, it's long. Nearly 2600 words. That gives a large canvas on which to pose different questions and then give convincing answers.

Obama starts by defining the Iraq intervention in what is now a characteristically detached/abstract way:

A war to disarm a state became ... a fight against an insurgency.

Huh?

The words United Nations and Saddam do not figure in the speech. What was the so-called 'insurgency' all about? What did the various 'terrorists' and 'extremists' mentioned in the address want to achieve?

In short, what values were at stake? Not really explained:

The Americans who have served in Iraq completed every mission they were given. They defeated a regime that had terrorized its people. Together with Iraqis and coalition partners who made huge sacrifices of their own, our troops fought block by block to help Iraq seize the chance for a better future. They shifted tactics to protect the Iraqi people; trained Iraqi Security Forces; and took out terrorist leaders.

Because of our troops and civilians –and because of the resilience of the Iraqi people – Iraq has the opportunity to embrace a new destiny, even though many challenges remain.

Iraq no longer is terrorised by its own regime:

I encourage Iraq’s leaders to move forward with a sense of urgency to form an inclusive government that is just, representative, and accountable to the Iraqi people.

Does Obama have any view on whether that same sort of governance structure should be rolled out more widely in the region? Who knows?

No message for the neighbouring Iran regime, or indeed for the pro-reform masses there who too are struggling for a better deal? Or for other violent oppressors round the world? No.

Part of the problem with giving such a long address is maintaining a coherent but not boring argument. Speechwriters accordingly put in verbal padding to add colour. The results (if they are not careful) can be clumsy and/or mixed metaphors:

... a belief that out of the ashes of war, a new beginning could be born in this cradle of civilization

our nation’s strength and influence abroad must be firmly anchored in our prosperity at home. And the bedrock of that prosperity must be a growing middle class...

Billions of young people want to move beyond the shackles of poverty and conflict

In announcing the end of US combat missions in Iraq, the President might have offered some thoughts on the wider lessons to be drawn from this episode. Instead we get only one:

... one of the lessons of our effort in Iraq is that American influence around the world is not a function of military force alone. We must use all elements of our power – including our diplomacy, our economic strength, and the power of America’s example – to secure our interests and stand by our allies.

True enough but not especially convincing, the more so since Obama conspicuously did not describe Iraq as an 'ally'.

Given the dire state of the Democrats in the US opinion polls, it maybe is no surprise that the President used this address as a pep-talk for his domestic agenda. But the shift in gear into extended passages about the need for new domestic policies was abrupt and somehow not quite right for this occasion.

Worse, our old enemy the Musty Speech reared its musty head. According to Obama the following are musts:

• we must never lose sight of what’s at stake
• we must use all elements of our power
• we must project a vision of the future
• that effort must begin within our own borders
• our nation’s strength and influence abroad must be firmly anchored in our prosperity at home
• the bedrock of that prosperity must be a growing middle class
• we must tackle those challenges at home
• we must give all our children the education they deserve
• we must jumpstart industries that create jobs
• we must unleash the innovation that allows new products to roll off our assembly lines
• it must be our central mission as a people
• today’s servicemen and women must have the chance to apply their gifts
• we must earn victory through the success of our partners

As I put it in a quite different context:

Speeches boil down to basic messages. What was the message here? Not really clear (and perhaps that's the Obama post-modern message?)?

Victor Davis Hanson:

Obama warns against “open-ended wars,” as if they are almost animate things. But wars end, not when they reach a rational, previously agreed-upon expiration date, but usually when tough, specific wartime choices are made that lead to victory or end in defeat.

One party must decide – for good or bad reasons – that it doesn’t want to fight to win, or simply doesn’t believe it has the resources for victory.

To say that “open-ended wars” are undesirable is a banality that offers no guidance for these real-life choices. A better truism is that America should not fight wars it does not intend to win.

Quite so.

Update: Roger Kimball magnificently accomplishes something most of us would have considered impossible and few of us would have dared attempt, namely linking this Obama address to the egregious burblings of Spode in Code of the Woosters:

Finally! The 'feedback' compilation arrives from a course I ran a few months ago for EU colleagues in Brussels on the general theme of Ethical Dilemmas in Diplomacy.

Everyone is dutifully tasked to complete these forms at the end of a course. A bundle of these forms show trends. Were the great mass of people pleased with what they heard, or not? What sessions stood out on the day? Any obvious clunkers?

But what catch the eye (of course) are the disobliging but somehow oddly perceptive sneers of the disgruntled few:

Rather patronising and arrogant style, giving examples/descriptions irrelevant to the topic of the training. Rather a stroll down the memory lane of a retired diplomat

For all the impressive scale of the global training industry these days, the whole business is to a large extent hit and miss.

F'rinstance. How many readers here have had professional training courses of some sort since starting work?

Answer: everyone.

What courses actually imparted something memorable and operationally useful?

Which of those courses gave insights you can recall and still use weeks, months or even years afterwards?

Almost none.

Back in the FCO I recall a senior management meeting when I suggested that we freeze 'training' until we had done some sort of survey of which training courses had actually been effective, and what techniques had been especially worthwhile in getting key points across to the punters. Could any one there immediately recall a brilliant training outcome?

Glazed uneasy looks around the table, followed by quick change of subject.

Back in 1992 or so I did a good management course with the London Business School. I can still remember a number of the sessions, but above all one on How to Break Bad News.

You need to tell someone that they have been fired or have not promoted or that a relative has died suddenly? Yes, there are ways to do this which help the person hearing the bad news cope with the bolt from the blue, and which help the person giving the bad news pace the occasion firmly but kindly.

I have had to break bad news to people thereafter, and (on the whole) have done so well, drawing on the practical techniques imparted on that one training session. Really good.

Otherwise I have sat through all sorts of other courses which have made no impact whatsoever, other than to allow the trainers and trainees smugly to tick lots of Investors in People and suchlike boxes.

My own forays into the world of training since leaving the FCO have taught me a lot. Such as the central role of video analysis.

There is just nothing to compare with being filmed then watching yourself in a role-play of some sort, even for just a few minutes. The gripping horror of the occasion is utterly memorable and so has a transformatory effect, as I noted last week in Warsaw.

We ran short mock TV interviews for the senior course members. They seemed to learn more about themselves and about 'communication' in those short role-plays than they had done in years of more formal training based on presentations and principles.

Conclusion?

Sometimes courses generate such seething loathing that participants invent new portmanteau words to express their contempt, in this case damning my tendency to be at once too anecdotal and too toadying:

Much too much anectodiacal (huge loss of time). Need of more time for case studies and exchange between participants.

Fine. Give me more time, and you'll get better training.

Suggestion  Readers! Send in short examples of what training has worked for you and why! Then I'll compile them and we can start to change the world

Over at Business and Politics I peer at the BBC through a powerful microscope.

Droll opening paragraph, or at least I thought so.

Back from Warsaw this afternoon to find myself at 12th place on the 2010 Total Politics UK Libertarian Blog list.

Up from 17th place last year, and just below the Adam Smith Institute. Wo!

Big Libertarian climber this year is Anna Raccoon, jumping from from 13th place to 6th. Here she is today, giving us a story with (as it happens) a Polish angle.

Here is another top performer, Devil's Knife aka Devil's Kitchen - always good to see what he has to tell us about fake charities - charities whose dominant source of income is taxpayers' money, and not all of which are Leftist.

Many thanks to all readers who took the trouble to support this blog by voting in the survey this year.

Much appreciated.

Part of next week will be spent giving some Speechwriting Training.

One of the things I have been taught on my Mediation training is the technique of 'reflecting back'.

In other words, a good mediator (so it is said) is not one who shows 'neutrality' by being aloof and detached from the feuding parties. That may work in winning some credibility, but it is not enough to win their trust.

To do that effectively you need to tune in to the emotional signals coming from the parties.

If they get angry and agitated, you should try to raise the tempo and 'intensity' of your reaction to their anger/agitation so that they feel that you are 'with' them - at least to the point of understanding why they are upset. For example by leaning towards them and raising your voice a clear notch.

The problem with someone giving a speech is exactly the opposite. Normally the speaker is quite interested in what s/he has to say, but the audience by contrast need to be convinced to tune in to the speaker and not play with an e-gadget until the dreary session ends.

So the speaker has the difficult task of quickly catching the audience's attention and then gently pulling them up through the gears to raise them to somewhere close to where the speaker himself is.

The speaker in other words has a higher level of 'intensity' than the audience. And if that is not managed well by the speaker, it can lead to disaster!

For a classic high-profile case of two speakers failing to get this right and being roundly humiliated, check out this one:

Thus it was that as the speeches droned on, more and more Bosnians present simply tuned out and carried on chatting among themselves.

An unseemly competition started. Which was louder? The mass of Bosnian guests, or the VIP speakers?

When the German Foreign Minister got going, a mini-crisis was reached. He could not be heard at all other than by shouting.

Which he did. To little avail.

The louder he went, the more the massed Bosnians themselves talked loudly, almost as if (perish the thought) they spontaneously thought it would be a good Balkan joke to drown him out.

So we connoisseurs of the Diplomatic Grotesque witnessed a fascinating moment.

A leading European politician from a country which had given generously to the post-war reconstruction effort was left bawling at a large crowd of senior Bosnians that they should be grateful to Europe, and respond accordingly.

And they did respond. They just ignored him.

All not-so-obvious enough.

But can you train people to cope with this sort of thing when they are not necessarily good speakers and may think they have little to say? And where does the speech-writer fit in?

Good questions. Let's see.

Off go sundry Crawfs to Poland for a few days, myself mainly working.

Not much posted here this month. Am I running out of steam for this blogging business? Or is it just grey, muggy, flat August malaise time?

Sigh.

Quickies to keep you amused for a few days while I am away ...

A gripping piece by Parag Khanna on the rise of cities over at Foreign Policy. OK, plenty is already out there on this subject, but this analysis looks at the wider foreign policy issues:

... just 100 cities account for 30 percent of the world's economy, and almost all its innovation. Many are world capitals that have evolved and adapted through centuries of dominance: London, New York, Paris. New York City's economy alone is larger than 46 of sub-Saharan Africa's economies combined. Hong Kong receives more tourists annually than all of India.

These cities are the engines of globalization, and their enduring vibrancy lies in money, knowledge, and stability. They are today's true Global Cities...

Neither 19th-century balance-of-power politics nor 20th-century power blocs are useful in understanding this new world. Instead, we have to look back nearly a thousand years, to the medieval age in which cities such as Cairo and Hangzhou were the centers of global gravity, expanding their influence confidently outward in a borderless world.

... perhaps borders don't need to change at all, but rather melt away, so long as locals have access to the nearest big city no matter what "country" it is in. This is, after all, how things really work on the ground, even if our maps don't always reflect this reality.

Think of the human energy whirring away in these new conglomerations. Where does that leave the rest of us?

Maybe the wholepoint of becoming irrelevant, marginalised and parochial is that ... you don't realise it's happened?

Back on home ground, Simon Heffer reminds us of the use of the gerund:

I once got a job by finding 24 mistakes in a piece of prose in which I had been told I would find 20, and which had been given to me as part of a test during an interview: this was because the person who had set the test, good though his English was, did not know about gerunds.

Therefore he had not seen that phrases such as “it was the shop being closed that was the last straw” should have read “it was the shop’s being closed”.

Quite. But if almost no-one other than Simon grasps that nice grammar point in English any more, has that part of the language effectively died out?

Finally, I have mentioned Ray Bradbury here on this site. He's still writing away at 90. Here is a glowing account of his life and significance by James E Person Jnr:

What remains for those who haven’t read Bradbury for some time are memorable books worth rereading and a collage of unforgettable images: the canals of Mars filled with fragrant wine, a gun that fires deadly bees, a man covered with animated tattoos, a cocky gun-slinging bully sitting down in a barber chair for his final shave at the hands of a barber he’s threatened once too often, a spaceship harvesting a small fragment of the sun, a frightened old woman racing home through the midnight streets of Green Town and groping for the light switch in a darkened room in which a stranger awaits, and an adolescent boy fearing for the life of his humble, decent father amid the autumn twilight in a small Midwestern town.

So if you are not familiar with this genius, buy this to get started

Plenty more Bradbury marvels where that comes from.

S'long.

What? You want one more?

Lileks as always is on fire. Can you look at his searching deconstruction of Peter Lorre in Mr Moto's Last Warning and not burst out laughing?

No, you can't.

Do widzenia!

President Obama has pronounced on the Cordoba Center (aka Ground Zero Mosque) controversy.Speaking to a Ramadan gathering he said this:

Recently, attention has been focused on the construction of mosques in certain communities -– particularly New York.

Now, we must all recognize and respect the sensitivities surrounding the development of Lower Manhattan.  The 9/11 attacks were a deeply traumatic event for our country.  And the pain and the experience of suffering by those who lost loved ones is (sic) just unimaginable.  So I understand the emotions that this issue engenders.  And Ground Zero is, indeed, hallowed ground. 

But let me be clear.  As a citizen, and as President, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country. And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in Lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances. 

This is America.  And our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakeable.  The principle that people of all faiths are welcome in this country and that they will not be treated differently by their government is essential to who we are.  The writ of the Founders must endure.

... And let us also remember who we’re fighting against, and what we’re fighting for.  Our enemies respect no religious freedom.  Al Qaeda’s cause is not Islam -– it’s a gross distortion of Islam.  These are not religious leaders -– they’re terrorists who murder innocent men and women and children.  In fact, al Qaeda has killed more Muslims than people of any other religion -– and that list of victims includes innocent Muslims who were killed on 9/11.

Good, principled stuff? Indeed rather safe, placing an emphasis on traditional US constitutional principles around which all might rally?

So the media thought, frothed up by White House spinners.

But then it all unravelled at speed, with all sorts of Democrats moving to put some distance between the President and themselves in this issue and sundry 'clarifications' coming from the White House.

Power Line astutely suggests where the President went wrong:

Obama's Cairo speech, delivered shortly after he became president, also relied heavily on the language of synthesis. The Jews have been hard done by, and so have the Palestinians, he argued. The synthesis lies in both groups recognizing the other's grievances, and proceeding from there.

The appeal of this type of rhetoric is obvious. First, Obama was able to cast himself as a reasonable man, capable of seeing both sides of an issue. Second, he was able to cast himself as a decent and charitable man, capable of seeing the good in the fiercest of clashing adversaries. Third, he was able to cast himself as an intelligent man (albeit in the facile manner of a bright college sophomore or a slightly above average law student), capable of finding similarities where lesser intellects can spot only differences.

Finally, and most importantly, Obama the synthesizer cast himself as a problem solver. His seeming ability to identify common ground was not just an exercise in intellectual nimbleness and human decency. For many, it held out the promise that longstanding conflicts might be made to recede...

... But Obama did not embrace, even intellectually, a synthesis in this matter. Rather, he came down squarely on the side of the imam. He spoke up on behalf of his right to build the mosque on "hallowed ground" without ever suggesting that doing so might be wrong or misguided.

In fact, he implied that putting the mosque at this spot was a favorable development because our willingness to have it there reaffirms who we are as a people and drives home the contrast between our values and those of jihadists...

Jonah Goldberg is unimpressed with the way Obama has tackled this one:

The supposedly pragmatic political wise men have been blinded by ideology or incompetence and have failed to see what was so obviously around the corner. A big, honking Islamic center built to capitalize on 9/11, in a building that was damaged on 9/11? What could go wrong?

... “He felt he had a responsibility to speak,” said David Axelrod, as if he were drafting the inscription on Obama’s Profiles in Courage Award. But by Saturday morning, Obama tried to weasel out of it with the sort of lawyerly parsing everybody despises. Speaking to reporters in Florida, Obama claimed he had no position on the “wisdom” of the project, and anyone who mistook his academic comments about building a mosque in Lower Manhattan for an endorsement misunderstood him.

Well, if his real intent was to remain agnostic, he should fire his speechwriter immediately.

Of course that wasn’t his intent. He wanted to seem heroically principled. But when he was hit with an entirely foreseeable backlash (according to one poll, nearly 70 percent of Americans oppose the mosque), he once again led with his glass jaw and, in effect, told everybody they were too dimwitted to grasp the brilliant nuance of his remarks.

Fire the Obama speechwriter? Yes.

Forgetting the merits, look at the poor technique and remember that it is not that politicians make mistakes as they all do - it is the quality of those mistakes which are so revealing.

Basically, the Obama 'remarks' erred towards a trite, oh-too-clever legal formalism which was clearly just not politically or morally good enough in the circumstances.

As some Democrat-leaning commentators are saying, President Bush would not have been so obviously banal. Whether or not you liked the policy, Bush's speeches had a sense of intellectual integrity, of someone not ducking the hard questions. Of, in a word, leadership.

Here's what I would have drafted. Note not so much the language, but the underlying chain of thought:

The 9/11 attacks were a deeply traumatic event for our country.  The pain and  suffering for those who lost loved ones are unimaginable.  Ground Zero is, indeed, hallowed ground. 

Some people see the 9/11 attacks as an onslaught by Islam itself against the USA. That's not what I believe. Al Qaeda’s cause is not Islam -– it’s a gross distortion of Islam.  These are not religious leaders -– they’re terrorists who murder innocent men and women and children.  In fact, al Qaeda has killed more Muslims than people of any other religion -– and that list of victims includes innocent Muslims who were killed on 9/11.

Our country allows freedom of religion. We have thousands of churches and synagogues and chapels and mosques. People are free to build new ones, subject to local planning laws and such formalities.

This is not the case in many parts of the world. And it is bound to offend and even annoy many Americans if support for this new Islamic centre in this special area of New York comes from countries which oppress Christianity, Judaism other religions in the name of Islam, or from Islamic groups which demand respect for their supposed sensitivities but rail against the sensitivities of others.

Tolerance is not a blank cheque for those who think ill of our country to abuse its freedom. But we do not deal with intolerance by being intolerant ourselves...

Something like that would have touched on the core policy and philosophical dilemmas here, at least obliquely. And sent a firm but friendly message to Islam that yes, it too needs to work towards the highlands of freedom and open-mindedness.

Instead, as Goldberg says the President's poor drafting has simply made the whole business much worse, not least for Obama himself:

By elevating an already stupid idea and a poisonous debate, he forced everyone to take a side on a polarizing issue (including vulnerable Democrats like Nevada senator Harry Reid, who, late Monday, came out against the mosque), while undermining his own credibility, not to mention America’s reputation around the world.

Tim Worstall takes a typical piece of headline-grabbing journalistic fluff ...

Within 10 years, the Gates Foundation is projected to have a GDP bigger than 70 per cent of the world’s nations.

... and proceeds to work out what if anything it might mean.

Not much, it turns out.

The BBC lovingly analyses Fidel Castro's speech to the 'National Assembly' in Havana:

... a hush descended ... He smiled and waved to the crowd as he lapped up the warmth of their applause ... a short but polished performance from the lively and healthy-looking Fidel Castro, his voice stronger and more assured ... Now it seems he may have found a new mission in later life - to save the world from nuclear destruction.

Thank goodness for that. I was getting worried there.

The whole speech lasted just over 10 minutes and then, seated, he fielded questions for another hour.

Er ... and what did he say then?

For that we turn to the Miami Herald.

Castro made a couple of blunders, referring to the Russians/Russia as 'the USSR' and 'the Soviets'. Plus he claimed that the Big Bang which formed the universe happened 18,000 years ago.

Really?

With all this fretting about nuclear war and now this, maybe he's getting all his Big Bangs muddled up?

What a farce.

Over at Business and Politics is my latest piece, on the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

It looks in a roundabout way at issues of information flow, risk management and 'corporate culture':

Perhaps our hard-pressed rig operator makes the mistake of fact, misinterpreting the information being pushed to him by all the safety systems. Maybe he makes a mistake of judgement: he reads and analyses all information intelligently, but decides to take a decision which makes everything far worse.

In either case it is possible that the decision taken would not lead to disaster, had it not been for an underground factor previously undiscovered or not identified as likely to cause extra risk. In other words, the operator was doing his best at the very frontier of scientific knowledge, but that frontier itself was just not good enough.

Of such tiny subtleties are vast calamities made. Lawyers can not wait to get their hands on these problems in any subsequent enquiry or lawsuit. Anyone facing extended cross-examination by a wily barrister over split-second judgement calls is likely to end up sounding, looking and feeling confused or foolish...

This morning I appeared on LBC's Nick Ferrari Breakfast radio programme.

I was invited to join Mehdi Hasan (New Statesman) to talk about the forthcoming visit to the UK of Pakistan's President Zardari.

Mehdi led off, unexpectedly (for me!) praising David Cameron for speaking out about the fact that elements in Pakistan were supporting or engaged in terrorism, even if India might not have been the best place to make such remarks for obvious reasons (Kashmir etc).

I then briefly made some of the points previously made on this website about the What, the How and Why of public pronouncements and the negative way they might be received.

I suggested that far from making the President's visit more problematic, the episode had raised the political intensity of the visit in a way both sides could use to good effect.

There probably would be a private tete-a-tete discussion between the Prime Minister and President to get their personal relationship on track; President Zardari might frankly tell Mr Cameron that he was doing his best to deal with extremist tendencies, and say that he did not need outside statements which made that thankless task more difficult by frothing up populist anti-Western sentiment.

Mehdi eloquently wrapped up by reminding listeners of many other statements of concern from Western leaders about divisions within Pakistan, now brought to the fore by the Wikileaks documents.

* * * * *

The more I do media work (and I do very little), the more I admire the skill of those politicians and pundits who do interviews often and to good effect. You need heroic concentration to maintain focus and not get wrapped up in interesting but confusing detail and/or blurt out supposedly clever things which pop up in your brain when you're talking live on air.

In case you want even more on this business about Cameron/India/Pakistan (or even if you do not), read this businesslike piece by Hasan Suroor in The Hindu.

It reminds us helpfully of one footling British diplomatic error after another:

This is not the first time that a British leader has gone to the subcontinent and returned with a bloodied nose. Indeed, there is a history of British politicians blundering into controversy on their visits to the region, leaving Whitehall to pick up the pieces.

Remember January 2009, when David Miliband, the then Foreign Secretary, found himself thrust into the centre of an ill-tempered row over his tactless remarks on Kashmir and the Mumbai terror attacks?

Or 1997 when Robin Cook, the newly-appointed Foreign Secretary, nearly ended up wrecking the Queen's visit to India by infuriating Delhi with an offer to mediate on Kashmir prompting I.K. Gujral, India's Prime Minister at the time, to tell him to mind his own business dismissing Britain as “a third-rate power”?

More recently, Gordon Brown was involved in a very public spat with Islamabad when on a visit to Afghanistan in the dying days of his premiership he said that two-thirds of all terror plots foiled by British intelligence agencies were hatched in Pakistan...

What is it, then, about the subcontinent that causes the famous British stiff upper lip go all a-quiver?

It is striking that while the more gung-ho Americans seldom put a wrong foot, the British despite their supposedly better understanding of the region and particularly Indian-Pak sensitivities never seem to get it right.

Mr. Cameron is simply the latest casualty of a tendency that, one suspects, has something to do with a mindset which refuses to recognise that the era of Britain lecturing its former colonial subjects while they listened quietly is over.

Yup.

Only tip-top speechwriters need apply for a job involving British oratory in that part of the world.

See the wild reaction on the streets of Karachi, as angry but illiterate crowds protest against the British Prime Minister's remarks about Pakistan and terrorism

Tsk.

It should either be Loo's or Loos'.

See also the distinguished role being played in the drama by HM High Commissioner to Pakistan, Adam Thomson, namely to be 'summoned' and given a severe talking to by the Pakistan government.

I wrote about this sort of thing back in May last year (alas the link to my DIPLOMAT magazine article back then no longer works):

You know the story. Only too well. Your spouse yells at you for what you have done. Or for what you have not done. Or for what you have come to represent in the tumultuous relationship. Frustrated and cross, you yell at your children. And in their frustration and crossness, your children kick the cat.

So it is with foreign ministries. Taking heat from public opinion and the prime minister/president on an awkward foreign policy problem? Frustrated and/or cross? No local cat available? Find a foreign one! Kick (out) a diplomat!

Mind you, Adam has strong family form in that part of the world and so should cope with this situation most decorously.

My piece analysing David Cameron's high-profile speeches in Turkey and India has attracted some attention, and various well-taken comments.

Part of the problem for a speechwriter for a top politician is to work out who the audience is, and craft the words accordingly.

Most speeches of any consequence by (say) a British Prime Minister overseas have several different audiences. They include:

• the people sitting there on the day, among whom may well be some local VIPs whose ears will be closely tuned to note certain policy nuances and inclusions/omissions of familiar diplomatic code-words
• the local media outlets (electronic and newspapers) for the in-country foreign audience
• the UK media - what is the headline you want them to carry?
• the international media: what headlines do you want to see in other countries who maybe follow closely UK policy and the policies of the country you're visiting?
• academics, think-tanks, chattering analytic classes - they'll pore over the text in slower time to see what if anything looks to be new/different and what may lie 'behind' any changes
• the PM's own political allies in his own party and its coalition partner - do some different policy emphases there need acknowledging/fudging?
• the PM's domestic opponents - what will the Opposition look to attack

In other words, it's all very well talking blithely about a speech needing 'key messages'. But getting exactly right different key messages to these different audiences is no easy job.

And let's not forget one other audience: history. How will this speech read in ten or fifty or one hundred years' time?

One other point about Key Messages. In the immortal words of Frank Luntz, It's not what you say - it's what they hear.

The speaker may think that the key messages in the speech are neatly turned for style and significant in policy terms. 

And they may well be. My point in that earlier piece was to suggest that they also might come across - be 'heard' by one or other of the various local audiences - as patronising or trite.

Getting that right is not about being good with words. It's about having a subtle, experienced understanding of what works and does not work for Indians, for Serbs, for Brazilians, for Malaysians and so on. Each community has (for better or worse) its own sense of what British Prime Ministers represent and how they should behave.

Hence the fact that many Bosnians felt insulted when PM John Major appeared in war-torn Sarajevo in a military jumper. That mode of dress may or may not have won some brownie points with TV viewers back in the UK. But it blew the whole visit presentationally in Bosnia. 

He was saying: I have come here to help.

They were 'hearing': This person is treating us disrespectfully - if our leaders can manage to look smart in this ghastly war-zone, so should a British PM! 

See also the bizarre visit of PM Tony Blair to Sarajevo in late 1997, when his spin-doctors refused to let him say a single word to Bosnian media people. The Bosnians 'heard' from this visit: rude, too grand to talk to us, flying in and out in a couple of hours - he doesn't care.

All of which brings us to David Cameron's unwise remarks about Pakistan and terrorism during his India trip. As Andrew Rawnsley describes it:

That remark was not planned. It came in an answer to a businessman at the very end of a Q&A in Bangalore.

It was a gaffe. I am using here the classic definition of a gaffe: it is to say something which is true, but liable to cause controversy, embarrassment or harm if spelled out in public. Scoring him on presentation, he stands tall at home, but is still finding his feet away...

Here is the view of John Elliott who is based in New Delhi:

Cameron was of course on target with his criticism of Pakistan, but India was not the place to say it because it diverted attention from his investment-oriented visit – unless you take the Machiavellian approach that it increased media coverage of a trip that might have otherwise made few headlines.  

It was also unwise to make such a snap remark without planning for the downside – in this case endangering Britain’s links with Pakistan’s intelligence services.

That's mainly right. Pakistan opinion will be all the more likely to be really annoyed by senior British remarks such as this when they are made in India. All sorts of subliminal and other thoughts surge to the fore in Islamabad:

• is he taking India's side in the Kashmir problem?
• why is he saying such things before he's even talked to us, and on the eve of the President's visit to London? Deliberate provocation?
• why is he undermining the people in Pakistan who want to modernise the country? This sort of thing simply allows the extremists to play populist cards against the West and makes a hard job even worse...

Key message for senior speechwriters and speakers?

Remember that there are many audiences listening to or reading your every word.

And that what you are saying and what they are hearing may be quite different.

Update: a very clever piece by Hugo Rifkind over at WSJ muses on what if anything in David Cameron's recent so-called public speaking gaffes was in fact wrong or unwise or ineffective. See eg this:

The spin, from Britain's Conservative Party, is that Prime Minister David Cameron did not commit "gaffes" on his recent, whirlwind world tour, but was in fact just "speaking his mind."

I am always wary of people who say "I speak my mind," as though that was a good thing to begin with. It's a better strategy, surely, to think your mind, pick out some edited highlights, and speak those. Otherwise, what's the point of having a mind at all? You might as well just have your mouth wired up directly to somewhere else entirely...

Yet, which of these messages was really a gaffe? It's a decent rule of thumb in politics that you can always afford to annoy the people who need you the most.

British Conservatives need David Cameron, so he annoyed them to agree with America. Israel needs British support, so he annoyed them to agree with Turkey. Pakistan needs Britain in Afghanistan, so he annoyed them to agree with India.

True "plain speaking" could never manage so many twists and turns. This was David Cameron speaking his mind by speaking the minds of other people. Gaffes aside, to my mind, this was a pretty impressive performance.

Not that I'm speaking my mind, of course. No. This is just the edited highlights.

My recent piece about the feebleness of Peter Mandelson's speechwriters looked ahead to the coming international tour of David Cameron to see if his people would do a better job.

NB folks, what follows is not about policy as such. It's about speechwriting and diplomatic technique, and the way messages are sent/received both explicitly and implicitly.

First, the headlines were caught by the Prime Minister's strong support for Turkey's EU membership:

When I think about what Turkey has done to defend Europe as a NATO ally and what Turkey is doing today in Afghanistan alongside our European allies, it makes me angry that your progress towards EU membership can be frustrated in the way that it has been.

My view is clear: I believe it is just wrong to say that Turkey can guard the camp but not be allowed to sit in the tent.

I will remain your strongest possible advocate for EU membership and for greater influence at the top table of European diplomacy.

Strong meat. But is it quite wise to strike such a forward position within hours of landing in Turkey?

Not according to this scathing review by Barry Rubin:

It is a textbook example of how not to conduct international affairs ... everything should be conditional. The message to be delivered is that it is in your interest to respect my interests.

Cameron did the precise and exact opposite. His message was: The UK needs Turkey. Turkey is wonderful. Its behavior has been perfect. We are desperate for your help.

What is the effect? A man goes into a bazaar, points to a carpet, and says, “That is the most beautiful carpet I have ever seen. I must have it no matter what the price! How much is it?”

In addition, Cameron committed some other howling mistakes, several of which will amaze you...

Which he proceeds mercilessly to describe.

It has to be said. There is a serious point here. To open a speech like this...

Turkey is vital for our economy, vital for our security and vital for our politics and our diplomacy...

... is dubious technique. It gives a gauche hint of subservience, almost desperation. You are vital to us! You are! The effect of which is to suggest deep insecurity  on our part - that we might not be vital to them.

Hmm.

On to the Prime Minister's speech in India:

I come here with a very clear purpose: to show what this new start means for our two countries. I want to take the relationship between India and Britain to the next level. I want to make it stronger, wider, and deeper.

To show how serious I am I have brought with me the biggest visiting delegation of any British Prime Minister in recent years. Members of my Cabinet, our most dynamic business leaders, leaders of industry, social entrepreneurs, civic leaders, figures from our most forward-looking arts institutions and museums, sports men and women, and pioneers of community activism.

Phew! Did anyone ask India if it wanted or needed this sprawling entourage of Busy Brits?

... this country matters to Britain for many reasons beyond your economy too (sic). With over 700 million voters and three million elected representatives at council level, your democracy is a beacon to our world. You have wonderful tradition of democratic secularism; home to dozens of faiths and hundreds of languages, people are free to be Muslim, Hindu or Sikh and to speak Marathi, Punjabi or Tamil. But, at the same time, and without any contradiction, they are all Indian too.

India matters to the world because it is not only a rising power but a responsible power as well...

Lawks - the Mandelson Mistake! Pronouncing on where India fits into the world these days - as if its our natural job to make such pronouncements, and theirs to sit politely and bask in our warm praise. Why should India care if it 'matters' to the UK? Patronising, anyone?

At the height of the industrial revolution in the United States, they said, ‘Go west, young man, in order to find opportunity and fortune.’ For today’s investors and entrepreneurs they should go east.

Another poorly cast paragraph. It seems to say that today's investors and entrepreneurs are where we are, whereas in fact they increasingly are in 'the East' themselves, and doing just fine.

... why should Britain matter to India? I believe our two countries are natural partners; Britain is one of the oldest democracies and India is the world’s largest.

Stop all this 'mattering'! Never say 'I believe'. Let the words themselves bring out your beliefs. And what has comparing the size of our democracies got to do with anything at all?

We have a shared commitment to pluralism and to tolerance; we have deep and close connections amongst our people, with nearly two million people of Indian origin living in the UK. They make an enormous contribution to our country – way out of proportion to their size – in business, in the arts, in sport.

I never like this glorification of ethnic communities as such - it sounds phoney, almost as if it nervously has to be said lest someone accuse you of being racist in expecting them not to make such a wonderful contribution. And what about the bad eggs in their midst?

India and Britain also share so much culturally; whether it’s watching Shari Kahn, eating the same food, speaking the same language, and of course watching the same sport. Many of you in this room will have grown up revering and watching Kapil Dev; I did the same in Britain watching Ian Botham. And Sachin Tendulkar, the Little Master, is so talented that wherever you are from, you cannot help but admire as he hits another century.

Aaargh. How bad a passage is that? The hapless speechwriter ran out of intelligent things to say so slumped into curry and cricket. Raaaacist!

We come at this from different angles. The Indian story is well-known. There is still a huge challenge but on any measure India is on its way, a rising economic power. On any measure, India is on an upward trajectory.

Help - the Mandelson Mistake comes back. Don't tell other people how well they're doing. Especially in a former colony, it sounds like proud teacher patting a diligent pupil on the head.

We in Britain are determined to work even harder to earn our living: attracting more foreign investment to our shores, making more things for the world again, selling ourselves to the world with more vigour than ever. I’m not ashamed to say that’s one of the reasons why I’m here today.

Look how defensive that sounds. All those feeble comparatives:

• work even harder
• attract more foreign investment
• make more things for the world again
• more vigour than ever

Here, more = less. It sounds too striving, too keen to make a point, too anxious.

Tomorrow I’m going to be talking to Prime Minister Singh about how we can work together to develop and deploy new and renewable energy sources, in particular to reach some of India’s poorest communities. If we get this right, it will be a triple win: clean energy, electricity brought to poorest people, new jobs and growth. And it’s precisely the sort of cooperation we need as we move forward in this relationship...

We must be the ones to act and we must act together. Together Britain and India can do the work that is needed. Together our partnership can benefit the world. So together, let us build this new relationship that can meet the scale of our great ambitions together

This passage illustrates what I don't like about this breathless, hyperactive, self-absorbed style of speechwriting. The PM seems to pronounce all sorts of things about what the UK and India could and should be doing together before he's talked to the Indian opposite number to see what he suggests and wants.

Maybe the Indians don't want to work with us to 'do the work that is needed', to benefit the world' in 'partnership'. They certainly seemed happy enough to ignore us in the Climate Summit endgame:

Obama sitting down with the Brazilian, Chinese, Indian and South African leaders to hammer out something or other among themselves, far from the madding crowd of NGOs and all the other leaders.

Thus it came about in spasm of post-modern irony that a small self-proclaimed group of countries defined the main outcome on behalf of everyone else, with the European Unionists (collectively the third biggest CO2 emitter) left outside. Ditto Russia, left holding its cute little red reset button handed over by Hillary Clinton. And Indonesia, a huge emitter. 

The progressive-Left symbolism of this is magnificent: no Dead White Men (especially those sanctimonious Europeans) spoiling the photo-shot!

We decide - Dead White Men pay!

In short, well done the Prime Minister for showing British energy and purpose. But not so well done in how messages are being transmitted. The basic tone as served up by the new squeaky-clean speechwriters is over-keen and unconvincingly over-confident: Hullo, I am your new best friend!

Plus it's characteristic of the speechwriting work of people who know a lot about the UK and political spin here, but next to nothing about Foreigners. It's far too much on Transmit, not Receive. Where are the following thoughts:

• I'm relatively new to this top-level international game. But I do know about the UK's national strengths and comparative advantage
• I know that we have interests. So do you. We traditionally agree on some things. We also disagree on some things. Let's talk
• I see areas where the existing relationship might be enhanced. But before plunging in to all that, I'm here to listen.
• I want to hear for myself your leaders' views, to talk quietly with them about where we might take things forward

Keep a lot more back. Cultivate some mystery. Imply that in some areas we'll be totally inflexible and/or drive a very hard bargain.

That is the oblique and efficient way to compliment your hosts - to hint that you relish disagreeing with them in some areas, because they - like you - are tough too.

Above all, the new government's speechwriters need to stop talking in this febrile paternalistic Mandelsonian way about other countries' successes and achievements.

Because in these days of commercially-minded diplomacy, it's none of our business.