Is right here. Behold the bewilderment, bemusement and sheer baffledness of Professor Mike Gonzalez at positions taken by sundry Latin American leaders on the general subject of Col Gadaffi’s career prospects: Yet the response to the Libyan events from Latin America’s radicals has been perplexing and disturbing. Chávez himself has […]
There was I thinking that Venezuela’s President Chavez was a crazed lumpen Leftist. And now he goes and confounds me by surpassing evil Wisconsin governor Scott Walker by handing out exemplary brutality to brave working-class Venezuelan trades-unionists. Hurrah.
Just back from being interviewed by BBC TV for the News at 2200 tonight (and for the BBC News Channel) on the Libyan drama, and in particular what options exist for Western policy-makers. The BBC had picked up my piece here yesterday giving a range of policy options. My formal claim […]
Middle East not scary enough for you? Try this magnificent analysis by Thomas Benton of precisely why US undergraduates are now locked in to a cycle of lame underperformance and associated petulance when their failings are pointed out to them: Increasingly, undergraduates are not prepared adequately in any academic area […]
I previously offered some operational ideas for Doing Something about Libya. One of them was this: expert support for opening of all Libyan regime secret police and other archives asap – let the dirty chips lie where they fall (mainly in Moscow?) The more I think about it, the more […]
The Government have made a deft, swift and successful power-play to send in armed aircraft and special forces personnel to rescue Britons from the more remote parts of Libya. The planning that will have gone into pulling off this one must have been first-class. Well done MOD/FCO and everyone involved. […]
What is it that makes Marxists so tightly entangled in their own folly, and so self-satisfied and proud of it? Here is T Eagleton reviewing a book by the ‘indomitable’ E Hobsbawm: In 1976, a good many people in the West thought that Marxism had a reasonable case to argue. By 1986, most […]
How has the FCO managed the Libya and other emergency situations? The only true test of how well the FCO has done is, of course, the absence or otherwise of shrill and ignorant moaning from the Daily Mail. So the FCO clearly passed the Tunisia and Egypt hurdles quite well. What, […]
I have previously written here about the FCO’s approach to ‘consular’ work (ie helping British nationals overseas). See eg here: The media love to pounce on allegations of FCO staff being unkind or inefficient when they find British citizens overseas who have hit trouble. For every hundred people who write in to you […]
Mary Beard at the Guardian writes a mainly interesting piece about Great Speeches, but look out for her peculiar idea that "there is something problematic about the very notion of "great oratory". For a start, it is an almost entirely male category." Huh? This is more like it (apart from the […]
