We’re having a live, almost Presidential-style “debate” in the UK on the program “Question Time”, ahead of our almost Presidential-style election. If you fancy “live blogging” it, like the Americans did, the place to go is perfect.co.uk. I won’t be myself; I will be sulking because an impromptu meeting at work plus childcare duties has caused me to miss out on a drink with the creme de la menthe of the UK blog community. Or maybe I will; much depends on how much of a fuss I think there is going to be over the Attorney General’s advice furore. Never has the phrase “the coverup is always worse than the crime” seemed so apposite; if they’d just published this straight off it would have convinced those who supported the war, and not convinced those who didn’t, for no net loss. Publishing it now after having fibbed so much about its contents, looks pretty bad.
{ 10 comments }
Cryptic Ned 04.28.05 at 3:15 pm
the creme de la menthe of the UK blog community
I prefer to use the phrase “creme de la crop”.
tvd 04.29.05 at 1:57 am
From what I gather, then, Blair was boxed in by the legalities of the International Criminal Court and fear of the UN. I do not know Britain’s laws—does it require the UN’s permission to wipe its bum? Wouldn’t want to do anything internationally illegal.
In any case, it appears such concerns forced him to emphasize the weaker albeit “legal” WMD case rather than Britain’s essential right to act in its own self-interest.
Those who favor a world-type government have no problem with that; however, when a great nation surrenders its sovereignty, especially to weaker and more corrupt nations (read UN here), in the face of enemies which respect no law at all, I do not blame a good leader for such pragmatism.
Sam Dodsworth 04.29.05 at 3:33 am
…Blair was boxed in by the legalities of the International Criminal Court and fear of the UN.
Boxed in by the public, the vast majority of whom wanted our “great nation” to “surrender its sovereignty” to sombody less obviously trying to foist a war on them.
…Britain’s essential right to act in its own self-interest.
I eagerly await (but do not anticipate) your explaination of how, exactly, getting involved in this mess might have appeared to be in Britain’s interest.
dave heasman 04.29.05 at 3:34 am
“I do not know Britain’s laws—-does it require the UN’s permission to wipe its bum? Wouldn’t want to do anything internationally illegal..”
As far as I recall, the preamble to the Nuremburg trials were of the form “You German rulers are not arraigned for losing the war, but for starting it”.
“when a great nation surrenders its sovereignty, especially to weaker and more corrupt nations ..”
(read the UK, France & the US at Versailles here)
Sorry for a near-Godwin, but that last sentence really would sound better in the original German.
nick 04.29.05 at 6:45 am
Those who favor a world-type government…
…and Dorothy the Philosodude skipped up the yellow brick road with that particular strawman.
Sam Dodsworth 04.29.05 at 7:48 am
You know, I think I do favour a world-type government. Or at least, I don’t see why the usual
arguments for the rule of law don’t apply on an international scale.
Is Philosodude an Objectivist, perhaps? His handle and the tone of his writing suggest as much.
tvd 04.29.05 at 2:50 pm
A deeper reading of the Philosodude’s site may reveal where his sympathies lean; they do not include Ayn Rand. :-)
Britain’s self-interest and indeed security were endangered by a luxury that al-Qaeda made no longer affordable, the Iraq “containment” strategy, as explored here. The moral (and rhetorical) implications are addressed in the provocatively titled “Ward Churchill Told the Truth”. There are things heads of state simply cannot say publicly, and to hang them based on those constraints is disingenuous.
(My greatest ire is directed lately at the Tories, who have played the sophistic “liar” card in regard to a war they themselves supported. Infinitely disingenuous.)
The disasterous Treaty of Versailles actually illustrates why international law is a fiction, because law cannot exist where there is no society.
The common denominator between then and now is of course France, which asserts all the rights of a member of a society, but does not acknowledge any of the duties.
Where the US and UK sought peace and justice, even at great cost to themselves, France sought only advantage. Ayn Rand, indeed.
Thanks to Mr. Dodsworth for noting that I don’t necessarily use “world-type government” pejoratively. One may be possible someday, when Rand and Machiavelli are refuted or France and a hundred other nations disdain instead of embrace them. Until then, Dorothy sez an “international society,” and therefore law, is the real yellow brick road.
nick 04.29.05 at 5:44 pm
Ah. So there’s a typo, and it should be ‘Philosodud’.
Harry Hutton 04.29.05 at 11:39 pm
Live blogging of Question Time? We’ll be dead soon, and there’s no afterlife. Almost anything would be a better use of time.
ab 04.30.05 at 10:14 pm
I watched debates of british elections on c-span and it was depressing to see that the right wing candidate there sounds more liberal than the democrats here.
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