The Progressive

Unpublished, and be damned!

Here are some of my letters that did not make the pages of that outspoken, high-minded magazine of the radical left, the New Statesman.

"Tony Blair's premature departure demonstrated one simple truth. Not even the best and most resilient of leaders can survive the kind of character assassination exemplified by your snide editorial remarks about his Middle East posting (2 July). However I can understand your disappointment since Blair potentially risking his life in the pursuit of peace doesn't really give you the  knocking copy that  a lucrative lecture tour in the USA would have provided."

"Following John Pilger's cover story of April 16, "Iran: we are being led into the most serious crisis in modern history" I have submitted a new verb to the Oxford English Dictionary for consideration. This is "to pilger" which means to grossly distort and exaggerate with a view to creating maximum hatred and alarm."

"Those, like the New Statesman (Leader, 9 October), who claim that the Iraq war has gained recruits for the jihadist cause are saying no more than that the cause of terrorism is resisting it. The answer is therefore quite simple. 'We surrender!'. "

They can dish it out but I'm not so sure about whether they can take it.

Let's twist again

It's Tony Blair's final full week at No. 10. And true to form the liberal-left continues to indulge in Blair-bashing right up to the last moments. This time it's the good, old Observer front-paging Channel 4's Rawnsley revelation that "Blair knew US had no post-war plan for Iraq" (see The Rise and Fall of Tony Blair this coming Saturday).

It's the usual treatment. Collect a number of quotes from the key players. Put the worst possible interpretation on them.  Add a bit of exaggeration and fact- bending. Spin in a couple of damaging sub-headlines, "PM committed troops despite chaos fears", "Bush offered to fight without the UK". And voila, Tony Blair is in the dock once again on a 'shock, horror' charge.

No case for the defence. of course. Nothing about what post-war planning there had actually been. The fact that no planning at the time could have anticipated the degree of depravity employed by the enemy. The fact that even if Blair had appreciated that the planning was below par he might still have considered supporting the Americans to be the lesser of the evils when all the other factors were taken into account.

The piece does admit that Blair repeatedly tried to put the Americans on the right track but instead of this being presented as being to Blair's credit, his unsuccessful efforts in this regard are depicted (spun?) as a sign of failure. Likewise  although Bush's alleged offer to fight without the UK could have been portrayed as evidence that the Americans were prepared to fight alone (thus negating anything that Blair could have done) it has to be interpreted as Bush offering Blair a way out that he did not take.

In other words the Observer's  coverage of this story was a perfect example of the feral failings of the media that the Prime Minister properly drew attention to last week.

Attack is the sincerest form of flattery

These are dark days for Labour, in the press at least. The only comfort is that the long period of drift is over soon, one way or the other. For the last two years every act or statement of every minister has been interpreted as a piece of internal communication and seen through the glass of the leadership succession. Whenever the government has tried to walk forward out of the mire, the press has contrived that it actaully moonwalks right back in. And let's remember too, the position that Gordon Brown is still in. Although the press are judging him as though he were leader, he's still tied up like Gulliver by a thousand ropes. He cannot take the inititive without seeming disloyal to Blair.

Polly Toynbee has an interesting take on the current row. She's right to talk about the Republican tactic of ventriloquism for negative campaigning. It's vital that the ranks of the disappointed in the Labour party don't become the dolls. But it's also vital to remember that the Republican target is always the strongest aspect of their strongest enemy. The fact that they are attacking Brown so fiercely is a mark of their fear.

Follow my leader

This valet, like all bloggers, is fuelled largely by indignation. Also, like many bloggers, I am obsessed by the comment pages of the print media. So to blast away the lethargy of Christmas, I have to do nothing more than read a few leader columns. Here’s the Sun on immigration:

“Now a Migration Watch study based on government figures reveals the true benefit: a paltry 4p a week. That’s not a lot for permanently changing the face of Britain. Without our consent.”

The nastiness of the final sentence is bracing enough to chaff away the fogginess of seasonal excess - like a crusty towel after a dip in a cold lake. The use of ‘face’ is suggestive and yet deniable. The old trope is there: ‘nobody asked our permission’. The battle of Hastings was hardly a plebiscite… Send back all those beastly Normans, I say!

The only way I can live with the contradictions of the Sun’s leader columns – free movement of capital, banning movement of people; complete license for motorists, coercive state control of young people; ban the veil, support the cross – is to follow the poet Keats into a state of negative capability. Once I have attained that Zen-like state, the stark contradictions dissolve into a pleasing fuzziness and my blood pressure falls back to it’s seasonal languor.

Or it would were it not for the Sun’s other leader (same web address) and the Telegraph’s too on Prescott. Calling the barracking of Saddam during his execution and the leaked footage of his death, ‘deplorable’, is apparently beyond the pale for these two papers. Both advocate all-out diplomatic war on Europe. However, it seems that servile silence is the right attitude towards Iraq from our proud sovereign government. Of course, the Deputy Prime Minister should resign for daring to comment on a disgraceful and needless travesty…

And so I am able to start the new year on as crabby a note as the old one ended. Bah, to goodwill, peace and rest. It is not the blogger’s way…

Let's have more good news for a change

Xmas is the traditional time for glad tidings. Yet switch on the radio or TV, pick up a newspaper and it's the same old story: foul murders at home, mass killings abroad, health scares, the NHS in crisis, the latest government scandal, the Diana conspiracy theories continuing despite the Stevens report, melting glaciers etc. etc.. The easy response is to say it was ever thus. But most people I talk to these days agree that the news is particularly depressing. If there is one theme running through what is put before us it's (to reverse the title of that hit song from The Life of Brian) always look on the dark side of life.

Now there's no denying we live in turbulent times and that it's the job of the media to report on them, however stomach churning certain items might be. Unfortunately it doesn't stop at that. The bad news just seems to go on and on, with few glimmers of light relief in between. The right, of course, currently have a vested interest in presenting news in this way, As HG Wells put it:

'against every party in power sits another devoting itself to misrepresenting, thwarting, delaying and spoiling...what the governing body has to do in the hope of degrading affairs to such a pitch of futility as to provoke a change in government that would bring the opposition to power.'

Then there are those elements of the left that actually prefer being in opposition. Their mission in life is to rubbish any good news emanating from this New Labour government to demonstrate how right they have been in standing by their Old Labour beliefs, The 50 achievements of New Labour?  Like Reg of The People's Front of Judah their response usually takes the form of " Grant you that, but what good has New Labour ever done for us?"

Finally, there are the media gloom-mongers who argue that it is mainly bad news that sells newspapers and pushes up radio and TV ratings. Accordingly the worst possible interpretation will be put on what Tony Blair and his Cabinet colleagues are saying or doing. Every difference of opinion is a rift that threatens the future of the government. Every minor Labour failing is a molehill that must be turned into a mountain. And for every more hopeful piece that survives the editorial cutting process you can be sure someone will be found to put the boot in.

Small wonder that this daily diet of negativity is breeding cynicism, despondency, and despair. Or that increasing numbers are turning from what they see as the misery of politics to more jolly, escapist pursuits that keep the pain at bay. To be sure we have to be aware of the bad news to do something about it. But too much immersion in what is going wrong tends to be corrosive to the spirit.

In contrast, there is a newspaper, Positive News, which, as its name implies is devoted exclusively to tiding of comfort, if not joy. Stories covered in recent issues include "Sweden Says Yes to No Oil", "Al Gore - One Man on a Mission", "Giving Economic Power to the Poor". As such it provides a tiny beacon of hope in the darkness that envelops us. However, good news can be a little bland and dwelling on it all the time can be as counter-productive as overemphasising the bad news. It's no coincidence that this approach to the news is usually found in totalitarian regimes. A "Candide" mentality is not really conducive to progressive change.

No, a balance has to be struck between the bad news and the good news such that the morale-sapping effect of the former can be offset by the spur to action induced by the latter. This might be done by compelling all news media outlets to devote at least a third of their coverage to uplifting stories. Too fanciful?  Then how about Labour supporters doing a bit more to spread the good news about what this government is doing. Or is that being even more fanciful?

Left right behind

The Observer's new columnist Jasper Gerard has already managed to earn his editor a reprimand from the paper's own readers' editor. He managed, in his third column, to make some Manningesque jokes about Gypsies being land-grabbing pikey car thieves. How bold! How original. The readers' editor saves his reprimand for the paper's editor for letting the remarks into print. Rightly too. Gerard was employed because he is a rightwing gadfly, not despite.

Editors of liberal journals sometimes equate rightwing lurches with edginess, sexiness and intellectual daring. The worst offender was Andrew Sullivan who printed extracts of the wholly meretricious Bell Curve in The New Republic. Yes the book was edgy. Any book that claimed racial inferiorities of intelligence would be. It was also flawed and provided an intellectual figleaf to ideas that should rightly be as naked as they are ugly. However, Sullivan prospered on the back of his tenure and set a new standard for editors. If you hear a liberal howl and start a controversy, something must be right.

Thatcher's Children are Coming of Age

I was woken up on Thursday by the Today programme doing an appreciation of 80s proto boy band A-ha. The chiseled Norwegians have just won outstanding contribution to popular music award from serious music mag Q. U2 and Liam Gallagher were all quoted as saying the group had influenced them. Almost had me... erm choking on my cornflakes... except I was not yet out of bed at that point.

This came a day after Newsnight had Kirsty Walk's scoop with Madonna.

as its lead item with former material girl getting all spiritual about her proposed adoption of a Malawian semi-orphaned boy. The day before that the South Bank Show consisted of Melvyn Bragg and George Micheal mutually hi-fiving one another before an appreciation of each other and in the latter case for some of the duration the potentially palavourous drug pot (GM's implication). Gorgeous George as you may recall began life as the talented but less good looking one in Wham! another one of those 80s pretty boy outfits with dubiously punctuated one-syllable name.

The Today Programme, Newsnight and South Bank Show used to be pillars of the establishment - focused on serious stuff and high art with little room for pop. But venerating 80s teenybop stuff? "What is the world coming to?", as digusted of Tonbridge-Wells might write. Interestingly both Madonna and George Micheal railed against Iraq in the oxygen of publicity afforded to them. Not sure what Morten Harket's position is on immediate withdrawal though. Aside from the Live8 message nonetheless, where is progressive, seriously engaged radical music these days?

I miss the 80s in some ways. Don't get me wrong: this country was ravaged by the divisive politics of Thatcherism where market forces dictated all. This had disastrous consequences - socially, economically... you name it. Politically the decade sucked big-time no argument but music did have some sort of message. George Michael explained away his declining record sales to Lord Melv by his increased political consciousness but Wham! did play miner's benefits to their credit.

We had a top 10 hit with the title "Stand Down Margaret" which was jolly good too - the Beat for you 2-tone fans. Would the equivalent come about today in the Pop Idol climate? Will McFly become celebrated by serious broadcasting in future years? Do harsh political climates/oppressive circumstances conversely produce better pop?Am I just getting old and jaded? Anyway I'll stop this rant here as it's getting a bit 'I love the 1980s' with some whingey bits thrown in. What do other people think though? I'm reminded of an article by US academic Larry Grossberg on postmodernism in music . LG entitles his piece 'Is Anybody Listening? Does Anybody Care? Discuss.'

The Amazing Missed Opportunity of Mrs Pritchard

Television writer/director/producer-types: maybe it’s time to give up. With your latest offering, The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, you have finally proven that depicting politics in any sort of 'bold or engaging'  way is beyond you. Why is this? And does it matter?

I don’t think there’s been a decent political TV drama produced by this country since House of Cards(1990), and that had to be drawn from excellent source material. ITV’s 1986 adaptation of First Among Equals (may you all forgive me) wasn’t bad. Our Friends in the North (1996) worked well (but also was not originally written for TV). Crossing the Floor (1996) was good as satire. State of Play (2003) was hugely enjoyable but first and foremost a murder mystery. And there have been good period pieces with strong themes. Stephen Poliakoff’s The Lost Prince (2003) was masterful.

But when it comes to original, contemporary political story-telling, it is embarrassing. 1993’s three-part Love and Reason, starring Phyllis Logan as a mining town feminist struggling as an MP, descended quickly from a challenging take on achieving equality into soap opera storylines and gimmicky real-life cameos. Annie’s Bar (1996) was just odd. Recent years have thrown up two absolutely appalling attempts: The Project (2002) and The Deal (2003).

The makers of the former claimed to have interviewed 120 people at the heart of New Labour in order to bring us an authentic portrayal of “The Project” yet when this tedious two-parter was eventually broadcast, it contained not one “revelation” that was either a massively open secret already or could be found in the press cuttings. It was determined to show how good people and good ideas had been inexorably betrayed by bad people and bad ideas in the New Labour Government. It did this by having the lead actor, Matthew Macfadyen, look permanently on the verge of tears and by having a female MP physically assaulted by a government whip.

Once all the histrionics were stripped down, the following conclusions were apparent: a) the ideals of youth are compromised by the electoral need to seek consensus and the realities of a market economy; and b) politics can be quite tricky and, well, you know, a bit political. Well, knock me down with a copy of Labour’s 1983 manifesto. I understand that the director, Peter Kosminsky, is now planning a sequel based on detailed accounts from dozens of Vatican insiders that the Pope is somewhat taken with the teachings of Roman Catholicism.

The Deal was more of a live-action Steve Bell cartoon than a drama, with Michael Sheen, as Tony Blair, smiling. A lot. And David Morrisey’s Gordon Brown, frowning and pouting. A lot. The plot was driven by the media-conventional wisdom that Blair and his advisors stole the leadership of the Labour Party in 1994 and were now reneging on the deal that made that possible, concerning the eventual handover to Brown. To be fair, the final, cathartic scene of the Granita dinner where we find out what “really” happened was suggestive of complications way beyond the central narrative. However, by that time, the theme of betrayal had been so determinedly thrust before us that all nuance was lost.

In many ways, those responsible for drama are simply reflecting the culture of their colleagues in news and current affairs, where the path of least resistance in representing politics is not so much naturally taken as actively sought with a GPS system and master atlas. Stories over substance. Personalities over issues. Entertainment over information.

At least those in drama are supposed to be about entertainment. And ultimately, as viewers, if we don’t like what’s been commissioned, scripted, optioned, produced and broadcast we can try the buttons marked “stand by” or “channels + / -“. It’s just so frustrating, though, that the most powerful medium in our society seems to only add to the background music of disillusion and cynicism about politics that benefits reactionary ideas rather than radical ones. Of course, it need not be like this.

I could hardly write an article on this subject without mentioning The West Wing (1999-2006). What set it apart from other efforts was, for something so entertaining, an incredible focus on policy. Dozens of episodes were based around the struggle to force through a new law or tweak a current one by committed individuals, negotiating a treacherous sea of party politics, public opinion, media scrutiny and economic reality for some greater benefit. This took masses of research and consultation to get right, a huge pool of knowledge and imagination to make compelling and a great deal of skill to hone into satisfying and inspiring tales of conflict and resolution. Such art requires huge talent and graft but, as Ros Pritchard’s Purple Alliance sloganises, it isn’t rocket science.

Though still too difficult for some, it seems. For with The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, people who have never really had to campaign for anything, persuade anybody of anything or even had an argument of any substance outside their immediate circle of family and friends are asking us to believe how horrible politicians practice horrible politics. In a horrible environment that is just all so damn horrible - to the detriment of the rest of us, overwhelmed as we are by this system. In this world, things are only achieved when people turn away from politics and towards real, decent people. Thus, politicians are set up as a breed apart and politics in general is denigrated as an elitist sectoral interest, uninvolving of and maybe damaging to any given individual.

This is a deeply conservative approach. The points it makes favour those who benefit from low voting turnouts or rely on the portrayal of themselves as somehow apolitical before manoeuvering to implement ideas that fall a long way short of progressive. Round my way, we call them Tories.

Now I’m sure that the people responsible for the programmes discussed above do not intend that. In fact, they probably regard themselves as the very epitome of progress. I bet somewhere in the offices of a production company there is a troika of a writer, director and producer developing the script for a drama about the how the world is saved from global warming, terrorism, starvation and dictatorship by a troika of a writer, director and producer.

Think I’ll wait for DVD. In the meantime, please just give us one British drama that doesn’t feel like a PEB on behalf of the Liberal Democrats, scripted by the leader writers of the Daily Mail.

The great windy express train of punditry speeds on

This is nothing if not a repetitive animal. Before conference, it wrote about the jejune way in which political commentators think about the leadership of political parties. It implored parties to screen themselves from commentators’ frenzied reporting of their own fickle opinions as objective fact – reporting who’s up and who’s down based on apparently nothing more than how they feel about them that day.

Well, it was as least as bad as I feared. I can’t bring myself to link to most of the commentators who wrote up praise or scorn of their heroes and villains. Too many had the overheated prose of a love letter from one public schoolboy to another. Many were haunted by new boy Cameron’s freshness, poise and vigour and very much wanted him to be captain of the football team. Some potential Labour candidates were simply wizard, others just oiks, and some were picked up, toyed with and dropped again. The whole press reeked of teen spirit.

Just take two from the Times, who like to present themselves as level-headed. Alice Miles, often an admirably sceptical writer. Even described as punky. She ends her deliberations with the sentence, ‘Sit, I’m afraid, still vac. Dreamer wanted’. Leave aside the strangeness of reading that without 14d before it, or (3,3) after. Can anyone imagine the giant raspberry, resounding from the Spey to the Tamar that would follow any British politician claiming ‘I have a dream!’ In ordinary mode, I sure Alice Miles would take most enthusiastic part in that national Mexican raspberry. Do we want to go the road of the politician as secular pontiff officiating at the altar of the Future, a bequiffed hoper and dreamer with shining family standing behind on the podium?

Meanwhile Mary Ann Sieghart takes subjectivism to a new level. Only even comprehensible because of a seemingly deliberate confusion of her own whims and perceptions with the values and priorities of the British people. Anyone for analysis of departmental records, future plans, realistic chances of winning in the electoral college? I thought not. That sounds jolly boring and like lots of hard work. But if the leadership of political parties is discussed only in these terms why limit it to politicians at all. Why not that nice Mr Hugh Grant?

Also last week Newsnight conducted a poll, which was reported in the Times and formed the basis for the weekend’s musings in the papers. The choice of Frank Luntz, without even a health warning, is fantastical. He is a partisan Republican strategist. Polly Toynbee, to her credit, rumbled his skewed choice of clips – although she ventriloquises some equally shallow criticisms of John Reid from focus group work. But none of it matters. The great windy express train of punditry speeds on, fickle, superficial and as shallow as a gossip column, its destination is always novelty and it never makes any stops as it’s already bored before it arrives. Once again, this humble servant pleads that the Labour party shuns newsagents when the time comes for a leadership election.

Don't count on the press for a balanced debate on Labour's leadership

This valet is far too humble to offer advice about the best way to make the eventual transfer of leadership into a postive experience for the Labour party and the government. But it is worth noting that the press are reaching a single view on the subject. Grave newspaper leader after grave leader cites the example of David Cameron's election as being a way in which a political party can renew itself, find direction and a new generation of policies. These are, of course, the same newspapers that criticise the same David Cameron for having no policies. There are also the same newspapers that covered the many previous Conservative leadership contests with howling derision, hoots and raspberries.

My point is not that contests are a good or a bad thing. But that we should be aware of exactly why the newspapers for so wedded to them. I don't think it's that they sell newspapers - it's that a leadership contest, played out in the public eye, gives the fourth estate the opportunity to insert itself as a fourth college in labour's leadership election. Newspapers delight in standing proxy for public opinion. They delight in assigning one candidate or the other 'the big mo' - often based on nothing more scientific than who they've had lunch with that week.

Am I too harsh? Contests really are the flavour of the week across the political spectrum. The Observer is all for them, two weeks running.  As is both the Sunday and the Daily Telegraph. The Telegraph states that; "there is no better way for a politician to reveal his true mettle than in the heat of a hard-fought election."

However, there is a stark contrast between these nobly framed battles of ideas and testing of mettles, and the way in which newspapers actually cover leadership fights. The same Telegraph writing about the LibDem race back in January, casts an eye over the candidates, and notices that Sir Menzies Campbell is Scottish. It recommends that that party 'avoid the celtic scenario' and looks at Oaten and Huhne. In later editorials it notices that Huhne was a federalist in the European parliament. By that stage, sadly, Oaten had self destructed. So all it could do is wish other candidates were in the race...  That is reminisant of Charles Moore's infamous endorsement of David Trimble as Tory leader in an earlier race .

Did the venerable Observer manage to stay focused on the issues when covering leadership races? In the Lib Dem race it wrote off Campbell as a figure of stability with no great analysis of his policies. Instead it embraced Chris Huhne, while admitting it had little idea what he stood for, saying: 'there is a problem. Huhne broke from the pack of new Lib Dem MPs to run for the leadership, but then his courage failed him. He has squandered his time in the spotlight talking up his experience as an MEP and fiddling around the margins of tax policy.' It wants to hear more from him.

Anyone feel renewed by that level of debate? If there is to be a contest, it must take place in the public eye, not in the media bubble. The newspapers will largely ignore policy announcements and instead chatter about background, personality, history, hair loss, children, partners, dress sense, handwriting, horoscopes... Al Gore may be popular with the left-wing press now, but in 1999 and 2000, he was dismissed as a 'beta male' and derided for wearing 'earth tones'.

If a contest is the road taken, I beg the whole Labour party to cancel their newpspaper subscriptions for the duration.