Choosing an angle

Has anyone ever noticed how much Mrs Merkel looks like Ken Clarke in drag?

Listening to tonight's Radio 4 Six O'Clock News and its coverage of Mrs Merkel's calls for a European army, I was very struck by its angle. 

The angle I've been reading this afternoon/evening concerns lots of pro-Brexit people saying that the likes of Nick Clegg have been proved to be liars, so you'd expect the idea of a European army to be at least acknowledged, in the usual BBC terminology as "controversial" - if only in passing. 

But, no. 

Instead we got Jenny Hill presenting it almost as if Mrs Merkel had finally, thankfully, got off the fence and done the right thing.

For here was Jenny telling us that "an uncharacteristically impassioned Angela Merkel was on fighting form" today and that, "after months of fudging her position on the subject", Mrs Merkel  had "unequivocally" backed President Macron in calling for the creation of a European army ("..albeit one day.."). And Mrs Merkel didn't just back M. Macron; her statement was also likely to "enrage" Donald Trump. Meanwhile, Donald Trump "took aim" at M. Macron "over Nato contributions, the Second World War and wine production". 

So the angle was: Mrs Merkel taking M. Macron's side against President Trump. 

Cast it in that way and the idea of a European army might well appear uncontroversial and might especially appeal to people who don't like Donald Trump.

Cast it, in contrast, as being the latest federalist move from the increasingly unpopular leaders of France and Germany and as something which will inevitably arouse concern among the EU's Eurosceptic voices and reinforce UK Eurosceptic voices then a different audience reaction might very well result.

It really is how you choose to angle it.

Abhorrent views

My nose measurements are: 4.5 centimetres from root to tip, or if you like, 6 cm from bridge -navigating the nasal tip - to the point where nose joins upper lip. It’s difficult to measure something like a nose, with no hard edges and no precise beginning or end. 

Anyway, I thought you might be interested, because I’m going to talk about antisemitism again. 

It’s exasperating that while even the BBC has started noticing the antisemitism in the Labour party, most people are still tiptoeing round the topic. Still afraid to say out loud what needs to be said.

It’s only when matters come to the surface in a tangible, low hanging fashion that people can grasp it, and satisfy themselves that they’ve dealt with it. Frantic virtue signalling is the order of the day.

So Gerry Downing  was out of order to say - what was it again - that thing he said about Jews? 

Oh yes, he referred to “the Jewish Question”, a chilling phrase borrowed from Hitler’s lot. Then there was Vicky Whassername who said Jews have big noses. Well, that’s demonstrably racist, therefore saying such a thing in on Twitter is undoubtedly deserving of a slap on the wrist.

These remarks are as stupid as they are offensive, and even Jeremy Corbyn couldn’t reasonably let anyone get away with saying them without sacking them from his party. So he suspended them.

Mark Mardell featured this topic on radio 4 

Mark Mardell: Is Jeremy Corbyn doing enough? 

Angela Smith: Well I think Jeremy Corbyn has a role to play here as the leader of the Labour Party. I think the entire leadership of the Labour Party, the Shadow Cabinet, really has to get out there and make it absolutely clear there is no place in the party for this behaviour. 

MM: So they’re not doing that now? 

AS: Well I think Jeremy could do more. I think Jeremy really needs to come out and say publicly that he will not tolerate this in the party. He said it privately at the PLP last night. I think he needs to come out and say it.

The Today Programme featured it, too. 

“Labour have suspended for a second time a member who posted anti-Semitic tweets. This follows days of accusations of anti-Semitism within the party. Speaking on the programme this morning is Jeremy Newmark, chair of the Jewish Labour movement.”

“Are you accepting that Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership has allowed this to happen?” 

“Are you hearing more than we’ve reported on here?” 

“What should Jeremy Corbyn do?” 

“Do you know when Vicky Kirby rejoined the Labour party? Before he became leader!” 

“What should Jeremy Corbyn do?”

Sarah’s questioning all but implied that Jeremy Corbyn was almost powerless to act.

What can you do? she shrugged, bemused. (That’s me, imagining it; not an actual account, since I don’t have visuals on my radio)

It’s all part of the convenient separation of two distinct aspects of this antisemitic virus. Part one is made up of childish, neoNazi tropes like the big-nosed, greedy Jew, hell-bent on world domination. This is the the low-hanging fruit, which Jeremy Corbyn can freely condemn. 

However, part two dwarfs part one. Beside part two, part one almost pales into insignificance. Part two is, of course, the part that hardly anyone dares to articulate - the Islamic-based antisemitism that permeates the entire Middle East, and the very thing that is at the heart of the Israel Palestine conflict. And so many MPs are beholden to the Muslim vote, so they’re effectively muzzled. And so many leftists are sympathetic to the Palestinian cause.

What does it boil down to? Well, maybe it boils down to Michael Foster’s outburst at the Labour Friends of Israel meeting in which Jeremy Corbyn made a speech without saying ‘that word.’

All that stuff about antisemitism in the Labour Party by Owen Jones, Hugo Rifkind, and even John Mann MP, a long-time campaigner against antisemitism, they all agree that antisemitism is worrying, and is increasingly prevalent in the political left. They insist that Jeremy Corbyn is not himself an antisemite, and many of them base their argument on some kind of analogy with Muslims. 

Just as you shouldn’t blame all Muslims for Isis, so you mustn’t blame all Jews for Israel, they reason. Which comes from the premise that Israel is evil. 

The biased reporting of Israel related matters plays an enormous part in fostering this gross misconception. 

Tom Harris covered the low-hanging fruit in the Telegraph, but he also  said:

“Anti-Zionism is not the same as anti-Semitism, these people plead in their defence. And care should be taken not to label every critic of Israel in the same way. We can hardly trumpet Israel’s (rightful) status as a liberal democracy and then try to shut down any criticism of its government by throwing around unpleasant accusations. Yet what is Zionism other than support for the creation and continued existence of the state of Israel? Scratch the surface of these campus revolutionaries and you will find resentment at the decision, in 1948, of the UN, supported by the hated United States, to recognise Israel in the first place. 

Labour must not, cannot tolerate such a view. And yet, among its rank and file it is becoming more commonplace, more accepted. That is surely inevitable when the leadership of the party is willing to tolerate Islamism, of which anti-Semitism is such an inevitable part.”

People Like Owen Jones are as resolutely anti-Zionist as they claim to be against antisemitism . Even Mehdi Hasan  (New Statesman March 2013) wrote about this. 

“It pains me to have to admit this but anti-Semitism isn’t just tolerated in some sections of the British Muslim community; it’s routine and commonplace. Any Muslims reading this article – if they are honest with themselves – will know instantly what I am referring to. It’s our dirty little secret. You could call it the banality of Muslim anti-Semitism.” 

He goes into more detail, but you can see where he is really coming from when he suddenly says: 

“No, the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict hasn’t helped matters”

So, just like everyone else, he’s ignoring the fact that the ‘ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict’ was  entirely and exclusively caused by  the inherent antisemitism within Islam, and he’s asking Muslims to recognise or tone down their own racism, despite Israel’s assumed malevolence. He is asking his fellow Muslims to do this, reasoning that they don’t like the racism (Islamophobia) that’s perpetrated against them. Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.  They don’t like it up ‘em.

All these saccharine mea culpas over antisemitism are superficial and quite disingenuous.

They will only be convincing on the day when the MSM, especially the BBC, reports the vile antisemitism that goes on relentlessly, day after day, with the blessing of the Palestinian Authority; the vile antisemitism that is rife within UNRWA, the incitement, the praise and adulation of martyrs within Palestinian society and the appalling indoctrination of children that is standard in Palestinian education.

So, MPs dependent on the Muslim vote, MPs and their followers who support BDS, Journalists and politicians who perceive Muslim migrants as ‘just like us’, they are all responsible for the upsurge in antisemitism. They may be good men who do nothing or no-good men who do a lot.

There was a major conference on antisemitism in Berlin. Did the BBC report it? Michael Gove said:

“There is a duty on all of us in public life to speak out. 

And to watch out for those with whom we might align ourselves 

There is a particular duty on those of us charged with upholding justice to pursue justice in this cause. 

That means asking how those who threaten Jewish lives, Jewish work and the Jewish people’s rights to self-determination - whether in Tehran or Tower Hamlets - can be confronted and held to account.”

Angela Merkel said: 

“It may be that [some refugees] have grown up with certain stereotypes"."It must be absolutely clear," whether to refugees or those born in Germany, "that antisemitism and other prejudices have no place in our society."

How is she ever going to square that circle?

While being interviewed about academies on the Today Programme, Lucy Powell was questioned about antisemitism. “There is a problem in the Labour Party which is not being dealt with effectively”  ventured Sarah, who still seemed surprised to have heard about this puzzling phenomenon.

  “We will not tolerate these abhorrent views”  uttered Ms Powell vehemently.

Haha. We will leave no turn unstoned.

This is where we came in. 

Antisemitism is hard to measure; it has no hard edges and no precise beginning or end.

What is called Thought for the Day

Before I heard today’s news I was going to write about Ed West’s piece in the Spectator. Pegida and the Left’s morality play.

I mean he’s only saying what we’ve been saying for years, but perhaps more eloquently. I mean he is a professional writer so I’d bloody well hope so. 

(Kudos to Nick Robinson for articulating something I’ve been on about for years 

“I am not, though, required to be impartial between democracy and the alternatives.” I say true impartiality is the prerogative of the inanimate object.)

I'll paraphrase some of what Ed West says:

• The MSM gives a distorted account of multiculturalism. (Tick)
• 
  
• The Left  has always been a morality play in which the protagonist (the white liberal) rescued the stranger/underdog (Muslim immigrants) from the hostile prejudices of the conservative. (Tick)
• 
  
• The Left can’t admit that ‘new Europeans’ (Muslim immigrants) might “bring their own prejudices with them”. (Tick)
• 
  
• German/European guilt drives hostility to xenophobia and nationalism. Tick.
• 
  
• Diversity has become a religion. (Tick)
• 
  
• A liberal immigration policy that entails importing lots of illiberal people will necessarily mean the end of liberalism. (Tiiccckkk)

All these ticks. Said it all before. In the light of today’s atrocity in Paris all those ticks represent a very  regretful schadenfreude.

 So why is Angela Merkel still insisting that Pegida protesters are basically right wing racist Nazis? ‘No to Pediga!’ I noticed that Angela was careful to include a somewhat hollow sounding ‘No to antisemitism” in her plea. But really. When you’re defending Islam, which has antisemitism deeply embedded within, how sincere can you be with your ‘noes to antisemitism’? Or how naive.

The Guardian was keen to impress that the anti Pegida marchers far outnumbered the pro-Pedigas. So why, one has to wonder, was the BBC so full of the Pegida protests all day yesterday? You’d think the BBC would have concentrated more upon the backlash, as is their wont.

Of course after today’s atrocity, we’ll have to wait and see how long it takes before the backlash question takes over.

Priorities!

Why one might wonder, am I restating the obvious, which has little bearing on the BBC? Oh yes, I almost forgot. 

Did you hear it? Did you hear it this morning? Thought for the Day. It was a corker. 

“Lights out in Cologne” he called it. As soon as you heard the title you knew what was coming. You knew the gist, but couldn’t know the full extent of the deluded misguided Lefty sermonising until you heard the text.

So I’m going to flesh it out. 

“Not so long ago I stood on the steps of Cologne Cathedral in Germany and experienced the poignancy of being somewhere that had in recent history endured dreadful human suffering.”

That’s right, evoke the holocaust to associate yourself with compassion and righteousness. 

“Cologne is one of the cities to have seen growing protests against what is called the “Islamisation of the West”.

“What is called the Islamisation of the West”  This new-fangled, puzzling thing that, being a bishop, I don’t quite understand; and what, pray,  are the Beatles?

“What began as a small demonstration by a couple of hundred from the east German right wing has grown into marches of up to 18,000 people. And the majority of these people can’t be brushed off as wild neo-Nazis, although such people are deeply involved in shaping and leading the protests.”

He knows what “The East German Right Wing” are then! They’re not “what is called the East German right wing. They are in fact, undoubtedly and make no mistake, renowned Nazi trouble-makers, which bishops like himself know all about. They’re the wild neo-Nazis who threaten civilization and community cohesion, and they’re the leaders and shapers of these protests. 

“What is challenging about this phenomenon is how irrational some of the comment by protesters has been.”

Irrational is a word I’d avoid if I were you, Bishop. 

“According to some, all Muslims are to be seen as a threat to the blonde daughters of civilised Germans.”

Yes, there was indeed that soundbite. You know, the lady who said, rather pointedly, that she had four blonde-haired daughters. Let’s hope she was alluding to the disrespect ‘the immigrant’ has clearly and tragically shown to the likes of her infidel offspring rather than the supremacy of the Aryan race, which was the elephant-trap into which she stumbled. I’d prefer to give her the benefit of the doubt, but even if not - who’s to say she was representing the real Pergida?

(Get it? I’m sure you do. It’s an allusion to what is and what is not truly representative of the real you-know-what.)

“In language that will sound familiar on this side of the Channel, Germany is being swamped by Muslims – despite clear evidence in some of these places that the numbers of Muslims is very low.”

Bishop my dear, in this day and age - the internet, Instagram and the like, that’s hardly relevant. Everyone can see what’s going on these days. You’re a Tweeter yourself are you not?  It’s to do with disproportionate demands, refusal to integrate, backward cultural practices and shooting people.

“Why is it that in such matters perception is so much more powerful than reality?”

Right back at you Bishop Baines! 

“And why is it that the fires of fear are so easy to stoke when people generally begin to feel a bit insecure economically – or that we often feel the need to turn inward and focus our fear or resentment on the ‘outsider’?” 

Why indeed, and why the scare quotes round ‘outsider’? Even you must see, if you know the first thing about Islam, that they (Muslim immigrants) are the outsider, and the most religious, devout ones choose to remain so, deliberately and on purpose.

“ This is not to question the power of perception or the need for proper (and informed) debates about immigration and culture – at every level and from political leaders.”

Well. Au contraire. It absolutely is. That’s exactly what it looks like. Dismissing the Pegida protesters as mere Neo-Nazis is just that.

“But, it is to dig beneath the presenting rationalization for such protests and ask if all is what it seems to be – or what we would like it to be. Genuine motivation is not always immediately obvious, especially where fear or discomfort are concerned.”

Then start digging. It’s high time. 

“Read the Bible and you find ethnic cleansing, dreadful brutality and fear of those who are different. Yet, read the same Bible and you get injunctions to welcome the outsider, give hospitality to the asylum-seeker, feed the hungry, love the enemy as well as the neighbour, and drop the fear.”

Bible or no. You have to fear those who are intent on harming you. The West has already welcomed the outsider, given hospitality to the asylum seeker, fed the hungry and by God, even tried to love the wretched enemy. I mean. Open your eyes.

And the message is clear: we have a choice how to behave: be driven by fear and insecurity into suspicion and hatred of the other, or take the risk of dancing to a different tune.

Tell that to ‘what is called’ the outsider.  I hope the atrocity that has unfolded today in France has, if nothing else, opened a few eyes.