Defending Sarah Palin

I'm guessing that if I looked out the window I'd see pigs looping the loop in the air, because I'm about to do something that I never thought I'd do and makes me faintly nauseous. I'm going to defend the crass Sarah Palin.

Defend her in a limited way, of course. Defend her against the recent allegations that are perhaps best summed up in this paragraph:

As for these disclosures, McGinniss claims that Palin snorted cocaine off an overturned 55-gallon drum during a snowmobile excursion, slept with college (and later NBA) basketball star Glenn Rice when she was an unmarried 23-year-old sports reporter (McGinniss talked to Rice for the book and he confirmed the relationship) and had an affair with Brad Hanson, Todd Palin's business partner, apparently as payback for her husband's infidelities. (Both Palin and Hanson, he notes, have denied the affair.)

Now I have no problems with these sort of allegations. The fact that Palin has snorted coke and slept around a bit is her own business, frankly. I don't even care if she has been having affairs behind her husband's back - that is between him and her. None of these reflects on her ability to be president. What does - and the reason why I think she is horrifically unqualified for high office - is her almost all-encompassing ignorance combined with the fact that she perfectly represents the empty and dangerous politics of style rather than substance. The problem is what she does in public, not what she has done in private. The problem, to put it in a much more profane way, is not who she has apparently been fucking, but the fact that she is a fucking idiot.

So there it is - a defence of Palin from someone who cannot stand her. But it is utterly depressing that what will probably finish the Palin show once and for all is not the fact that she has time and time again paraded her stupidity in public, but the utter irrelevancies of what she may have done in her private life.

Watch Out!

Your tweets could be published by newspapers.

God knows who would want to publish them, though. In my experience of Twitter, the average Tweet is either "NGGGGH really h8 the Tories and traitorz in Lib DUMS!" or "Just had a really nice sandwich". Occasionally, the calibre sinks even lower to something like "Just did a big shit. Really stank." No doubt many will question whether this constitutes a further invasion of our privacy; I'll use it as a chance to ruminate once more on just how little of what is said on Twatter is actually worth reading...

The Daily Mail Tendency: Ed Miliand

Nothing like The Daily Mail to make me feel some sympathy for a political leader that I just plain don't like. Here's the headline from part of their coverage of the election of Ed Miliband to Labour leader:

Ed Miliband becomes first British political leader of a major party to be living with his family out of wedlock

Oh my, have we travelled back in time? Is this a headline in a newspaper in the year 2010, or the judgmental musings of a conservative parson in a Dickens' novel from over a century ago? Because I honestly can't tell the two apart. I particularly like the phrase "out of wedlock" - it isn't often that The Daily Mail couches its reactionary bigotry in such quaint terms.

It should go without saying that Ed Miliband's domestic arrangements are irrelevant to his potential to be a good leader. However, given the hugely conservative and mainstreams views of many of the fat-tongued, knuckle-dragging fucktards who read The Daily Hate, it is worth stressing that while there are many reasons to question whether Miliband Minor is fit to be Labour leader (let alone Prime Minister) his marital status is not one of them. Whatever the snide commentary of The Daily Mail might have you believe.

Iain Dale: Missing the Point

Iain Dale not so much missing the point as turning in the opposite direction as it whooshes past him:

Andy Coulson is bloody good at his job. That's why the likes of The Guardian, Alastair Campbell, Prescott and Johnson are doing their best to jump on the back of the New York Times story about an ex News of the World journalist who was sacked by the paper for persistent drug and alcohol problems. You don't think he might have a grudge, do you?

The fact that someone might be good at their job doesn't mean that they haven't done dubious things in their past. Besides Alastair Campbell was good at his job; that doesn't stop him from being a total cunt now, does it?

And because someone was sacked for drug and alcohol problems doesn't mean that they can't tell the truth. Indeed, whistle-blowers are often those who feel betrayed - rightly or wrongly - by the organisations they report on. Take John Dean for example - he was fired by Nixon, and grew to have a grudge against that administration. However, that doesn't mean his testimony was any less truthful because of that grudge.

They all want Coulson's scalp. Well, sod 'em.

Of course they want Coulson's scalp - just as Tories love to get the scalps of Labourites. This is basic politics. And it works both ways, as Dale full well knows.

The Police investigated this and found that Coulson had nothing to answer for. So did the DCMS Select Committee. Clearly that's not good enough for Campbell and Prescott - those very models of good media practice and personal conduct.

And here we have the rub; the police did investigate, but it appears that investigation was - at best - flawed. So citing a flawed investigation in order to absolve a man who had to resign over the conduct of one his employees just isn't that credible, really.

Anyway, this story isn't just about Coulson - it is about the Met's collusion with the News of the World in order to stop a police investigation into criminal activity. That's why citing the previous investigation is pointless nonsense - the story is about the flaws of that investigation.

Whatever people thought of Andy Coulson's appointment back in 2006, over the last four years he has proved himself in the job. He's bloody good at it.

Again, so? Blair was good at his job - does that mean we should absolve him of all of the things he did wrong? No, of course not. But then Blair's Labour, and Coulson's a Tory. So Coulson is allowed, in the tribalistic view of Iain Dale, to get away with things that a Labourite should be condemned for.

His accusers are political opportunists who were part of a government which did far worse things than anything Coulson is accused of.

Yeah, but even if you accept that Coulson's detractors have done bad things that are worse than what Coulson is accused of, it doesn't mean that these potential crimes shouldn't be properly investigated. By that logic, we shouldn't expect the police to investigate burglaries because there are murderers out there.

As far as I am concerned they can go to hell. Coulson is innocent until proven guilty.

Unfortunately, with Met apparently colluding with the News of the World, it is impossible for Coulson to prove himself innocent, just as those wanting to prove him guilty can't do so either. This is the problem - if there isn't a thorough investigation, then we will never know what happened.

Dale has lost himself, and his grip on logic, in the fact that some Labour types have been calling for the resignation of a Tory. That isn't the point, and it isn't the story. The issue is that the police may have colluded with a newspaper to hide the truth. It isn't a party political issue; it is an issue about the impartiality of the police force. It is a broad story with wide implications. Getting your panties in a twist about the involvement of Coulson is to miss the point.

Besides, does anyone doubt for a second that if this story was about the potentially criminal activity of a Labour party member then Dale would be demanding action, investigations and resignations?

Guido and the Right to Publish

Yup, I'm jumping on the bandwagon and asking the question "was Guido right to publish his story about Hague and his aide?"

Now, my thoughts on the right of politicians to have a private life can be found here and here and I've got little to add; the fact that I don't approve of our salacious desire to see behind the net curtains of our political class doesn't mean I want it to be banned. After all, there's lots of things in Britain today that I don't approve of but that continue regardless; Jamie Oliver, EastEnders, chugging. I, and many others, may not like muck-raking, but it will carry on regardless.

And Guido is a muck-raker. His site isn't, has never been and never will be, about high-brow political debate conducted with sensitivity. It is a tabloid blog - which is precisely why it is so successful. People can visit the site to vent their frustration and anger against politicians, and because Guido is prepared to publish stories that the mainstream media is often wary of (the Hague story being a great example) those visiting the site will sometimes be treated to genuinely breaking news. It is a simple, unsophisticated format, but it works.

The Hague story was the sort of thing that was right up Guido's street, particularly since the mainstream media were dancing around the story without actually taking the plunge and publishing it. So Guido can claim that he was doing a public service by publishing info that no-one else would. This I get; this I can agree with. The problem lies not so much in the fact that the story was published, but rather the content of the story.

I'd have quite a bit of sympathy with a story that questioned whether Hague's SpAD was actually capable of doing his job - given said SpAD was being paid from the public purse, I'd say this is a legitimate story. The problem is that Guido's story, and much of the speculation around it, didn't centre on the question of the SpAd's ability. The at times overpowering undertone had nothing to do with the question of competence; it was all about the homophobic innuendo. For example, the claim that Hague and the SpAD shared a twin room in the election campaign was met with almost audible schoolboy sniggers, despite the fact that people of the same gender can share twin hotel rooms without having crazy monkey sex all night long. The legitimate question about the adviser's competence ended up being lost beneath an avalanche of innuendo.

Which means that the SpAD didn't go because he wasn't competent, but rather because of a homophobic whispering campaign. And we're left with no real evidence of any sort of an affair between Hague and his adviser, and legitimate questions about Hague's judgment in hiring some who, on face value, was not the best choice for the role have been lost behind statements about miscarriages.

So yeah, Guido was right to publish - however the tone of his story and the subsequent speculation about Hague's sexual orientation have robbed his story of its initial legitimacy. The real questions go answered because the story ended up going down the dead-end route around sexuality, rather than questions about competence. Guido may now be trying to redirect the story, but the resignation of the SpAD and the embarrassment for Hague had little to do with questions of competence, and everything to do with innuendo.

Anyway, enough already. The SpAd's gone, we know about the Hagues' miscarriages, that's (more than) enough. There are other stories out there that warrant, if not demand, discussion.

Gay, Bi, Straight, Whatever

The weekend just gone seems to have had its share of whispering around the sexual orientation of Cabinet Ministers; Crispin Blunt came out as gay while others have been coyly (or not) asking around the question "is another senior Tory Minister gay?"

The answer all decent people should be giving to that question is, of course, who the fuck cares? Seriously, why does it matter whether or not someone is gay? If they happen to be gay and married, they it will probably be a problem for their spouses and families, but that's it. That's where it stops. It does not matter one jot whether someone is gay, straight, bisexual or any other combination of orientations. At this point I could argue that sexuality is actually something to complex that it defies easy categorisation, but I won't - because it doesn't matter what a politician's sexual orientation is.

Yet it does matter that we allow our media to get away with this speculation and at times, as a nation, let ourselves get swept away by titillating speculation about the private lives of others. And when need to stop. We should hold our politicians to account and viciously attack them when they fail - in their public roles. As long as they are not doing anything illegal in their private lives, they should remain just that - private.

And this isn't just about who politicians are humping or even what gender they prefer to hump. I don't want to hear about their spouses and I certainly don't want to hear about their sodding kids. I don't want know what to see photos of Cameron's new baby, I don't what to know what it is called - hell, I don't even care what gender it is. I want him to run the fucking country, and do so well. I don't expect him to be preening with his new tot like a z-list celebrity milking the profitable teat of Hello magazine.

Because removing the right of our politicians to have a private life creates this expectation that they will share every element of their private lives with us. Which means that those who are vying for high-office in this country are not those most capable of carrying out that office, but rather are the sort of preening narcissistic fucks who revel in the constant exposure of the media limelight. The end result of this obsession with the private lives of our politicians is not a purer breed of political leaders, but rather Tony fucking Blair.

Gay, not gay, undecided, asexual, both; the only suitable answer should be that you really couldn't give a fuck anyway.

Body Scanner Abuse

As soon as I heard about the new airport body scanners, I knew someone would abuse the machines. But even I didn't think it would happen this quickly:

A security worker at London's Heathrow Airport has received a police warning and faces disciplinary action over claims he ogled a female colleague using a full-body scanner, officials said on Wednesday.

The 25-year-old worker made lewd comments after his colleague Jo Margetson, 29, mistakenly strayed into the scanner, which can see through clothes to produce an image of the body, the Sun newspaper reported.

So there we have it. Body scanners are being abused. Because technology may be tell whether someone is carrying a weapon, but human beings are going to be just as interested in a scan of someone's tits and genitals as they are in whether that person is carrying a bomb or not. Security technology will be consistently undermined by some of those people who use that technology.

*Link via the Moai.

Phone Hacking... *Yawns*

Try as I might, I can't get too excited about this 'phone hacking scandal. Yeah, it seems to be seedy, shameful and distasteful. And as such, exactly in keeping with the News of the World. Besides, the 'phone tapping is against the law. So no doubt the police and the CPS will act, if there is grounds to do so. As the UK goes to hell in a handcart, I struggle to get too worked up on behalf of some politicians and celebrities who have had the New of the Screws invading their privacy. 

I'm also not that worried about Andy Coulson. I don't necessarily think he should resign - for what it is worth. These sins were committed before he became Cameron's media manager, unlike, say, the sins of one *Mister* McBride. But really, I don't care that much about who is Cameron's spin doctor. If Coulson has to seek alternative employment... well, it isn't going to make any real difference to me. 

Finally we have Prescott belly-aching about how he might have had his phone hacked. This is John Prescott - the man who was Deputy Prime Minister in one of the governments that worked so hard to erode the civil liberties of almost everyone in this country - and he has had his privacy invaded. Well, boo-fucking-hoo. Listen closely, Prezza. That is the world's smallest violin. And you can guess who it is playing for. 

John Edwards and Privacy

Another day, another scandal descending on a politician – this time in the US. Via Guido, I see that John Edwards, (twice) failed candidate for the Democrat nomination for President and failed candidate for the Vice-Presidency, has admitted to having an affair. The world should emit a deep sigh of ennui at the revelation that a politician can’t keep his winky in his trousers.

As far as I am concerned, who really cares? This is a private matter for Edwards and his family. He had an affair, he hurt his wife, he hurt his kids. He should be allowed to deal with it in his own way outside of the glaring limelight of the media glare. This, fundamentally, is a private matter.

That said, I do think there was something very naïve in Edwards believing he could run for President without this affair coming out. Seriously, in this day and age the media will find out. And by thrusting himself into the (inter)national spotlight he will have had everyone digging into his past, desperate for any potentially salacious story. How he thought this wouldn’t come out is utterly, utterly beyond me. It has all the hallmarks of a great story – photogenic candidate for President, having an affair. A potential love child in the background. How could this not become a major news story?

It is a bit like Mark Oaten running for the Lib Dem leadership a few years ago. It could not fail to be the sort of news story that the News of the Screws loves, and their readership devours. Yes, you could argue that Oaten, Edwards etc have a right to privacy – and I would be inclined to agree with you. And I think one of the reasons that many capable people do not run for government is that they do not want to put themselves or their loved ones through the harsh, searching eyes of the media. However, that media glare is there. So whilst I feel for Oaten, for Edwards, for all the others, I also wonder just how the hell they thought they would be able to get away with running for high office with such media friendly skeletons lurking in their closets.

Privacy and Max Mosley

When is your private life not private? When it can shift newspapers, of course.

As Max Mosley has found to his cost.

Regardless of what you think about Mosley’s activities, try a spot of empathy for a moment. Imagine it is you, having a sexual encounter that could be construed as embarrassing, paraded across the headlines. Imagine how it must feel to have your intimate moments splashed across the tabloids. Let’s be honest, it wouldn’t be grand for anyone, would it?

And that is exactly what has happened to Mosley. There is no real public value to this story; Mosley’s sex life is his issue and his issue alone. It doesn’t matter whether he likes kinky sex and it doesn’t matter whether or not he likes to dress up as a Nazi. It wouldn’t matter if he liked to dress up as Bobby Davro whilst having a carrot shoved where the sun don’t shine at the same time as furtively jerking off – it should be private to him. As unpleasant as you might perceive someone else’s idea of getting their rocks off might be, as long as it is between consenting adults, it should not matter.

What does intrigue me is the way this story is being reported. Take this article from The Daily Hate. It works quite hard to sound neutral – and no wonder, because if they criticise Mosley directly no doubt they will end up in court as well – but the detail the article goes into is quite striking. I mean, the article is so long that it is broken into sub-headings. There is a level of detail that you just wouldn’t see with a far more important story – like the latest abortion of a policy from Gordon Brown, for example. There is even a picture that details exactly what Mosley has been getting up to. That is quite startling – a daily tabloid publishing a photo of an act that would be described by some as depraved.

There is only one reason why there is so much detail in the article. It is because the readers of the paper want that level of detail. The article is titillation, pure and simple. It is a lurid little story for the readers; a chance to marvel at what other people get up to – and then the opportunity to judge those people. The message is simple from this story – and from other famous people who have had their private lives splashed across the tabloids. You have a right to a private life, just so long as you are not a (even very slight) celebrity or person of interest who has a slightly unconventional sex life. If you are such a person, then your sex life is going to be splashed across the headlines – like it or not.

I don’t know whether this prurient interest in the sex lives of others is curiously British thing or not – although I rather suspect it is. What I do know is that private lives should be private, not fair game for any tabloids trying to shift extra copies of their rags through a sordid little article.

Personal Should Be Personal

For once I agree with Red Ken. It is an odd feeling; not that pleasant. In fact, it makes me feel a little dirty. However, on the subject of his fertile loins and the subsequent sprogs, he is pretty much spot on:

“I don’t think anybody in this city will be shocked by what two consenting adults do, as long as you don’t include children, animals and vegetables.”

Seems a little bit harsh on the vegetable fetishists, but aside from that, he’s right. His personal life should be an irrelevance. Ken could have 12 children, and it doesn’t matter one jot. I’m more concerned about the rise in crime in London. Or his propensity to spend money like it is going out of fashion. Those things actually matter. His kids shouldn’t – at least for the voters.

Likewise, who cares if Nick Clegg as played hide the chipolata with 30-odd women? It shouldn’t matter whether he has touted his pork sausage about a bit or lived like a frickin’ monk. The personal life of Nick Clegg – and any other politician – should be irrelevant, as long as it does not impact on their abilities to do their job.

So don’t vote against Ken because of his kids. Don’t vote against Clegg because of his claim of numerous lovers. There are enough policy and competence reasons to vote against both of those guys; there is no reason to give a flying fuck about their personal lives. Let’s leave behind the prudish morals for the 1950’s, and instead focus on their politics. That way we might get competent politicians in power, as opposed to those who are elected simply because they would fit into a 1950’s US sitcom without any problems.