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Notes on a credulous age

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Nigel Farage’s claims of BBC bias are part of his act – journalists shouldn’t play along

  • Posted on June 24, 2019
  • Polemics from Ogreville

This article was originally published on politcs.co.uk on May 17th, 2019. Nigel Farage’s risible claims of BBC bias this week were remarkable not so much for his dismissal of any public scrutiny ahead of the EU elections, but for the way he was able to…

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Why is media-basher Jeremy Corbyn speaking on a panel defending journalists like Lyra McKee?

  • Posted on June 24, 2019
  • Polemics from Ogreville

This article was first published in Quilliam Journal on May 3rd, 2019.  These are the times that try men’s patience. Sample the following from an email sent by the National Union of Journalists to their members about an upcoming event: “Lyra McKee was murdered doing…

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Is Bernie Sanders white? Who cares?

  • Posted on May 2, 2019May 4, 2019
  • Polemics from Ogreville

As Joseph Biden warmly caresses his way into the race for the Democratic candidacy (big surprise, there), 2020-watchers have another pressing question to address: Are Jews white? I’m prompted to ask not by yet another shooting at a US synagogue (this time in San Diego),…

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A Private War?

  • Posted on May 2, 2019June 24, 2019
  • A Struggle for Culture

This article was originally published in Progress on April 11th, 2019. As windy talk of a ‘truly global Britain’ fades away, a recent film makes the case for international solidarity – though less by its merits than its flaws. ‘A Private War’ is a dramatisation…

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When Labour defends racists and tyrants, how can it fight injustice?

  • Posted on February 22, 2019
  • Polemics from Ogreville

This article was originally published on politcs.co.uk on February 12th, 2019. The row over a ‘no-confidence’ vote on Luciana Berger last week was just the latest sordid episode in the Labour party’s identity crisis. What set this one apart was the context, with several Labour…

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Keep on schlepping in the free world – James Bloodworth’s prole odyssey

  • Posted on October 26, 2018October 26, 2018
  • A Struggle for Culture

James Bloodworth is one of the few writers around who is as committed to human rights abroad as he is to economic democracy at home. In fact, he’s for both everywhere. This marks him out among a commentariat which, depending on ideology, will either neglect…

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Crown Prints: Saudi Arabia’s problem is monarchy, not one thuggish prince

  • Posted on October 25, 2018October 25, 2018
  • Polemics from Ogreville

It looks as if Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, is a “moderniser” after all, having apparently been influenced less by Machiavelli than by Martin Scorsese. Whatever the truth of the gruesome “bone saw” rumours, it’s a moral certainty that journalist Jamal Khashoggi was…

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The Canary is not journalism – it’s a government mouthpiece in waiting

  • Posted on October 8, 2018July 7, 2019
  • Polemics from Ogreville

This article was originally published on politcs.co.uk on October 5th, 2018. According to the 1987 film The Lost Boys, a vampire may only enter your home if you invite them in. Two august institutions nearly failed that test recently, when the Guardian‘s offices in London…

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Corbynism is the opium of the credulous

  • Posted on September 27, 2018September 27, 2018
  • Polemics from Ogreville

In the 1962 film The Music Man, con artist Harold Hill dupes and fleeces River City, Iowa, using only his charm and wit. Jeremy Corbyn has managed to do the same to the Labour Party with neither. Corbyn’s total mastery of the party is clear…

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George Grosz’s internal commissar – review of Aftermath at Tate Britain

  • Posted on September 21, 2018September 25, 2018
  • A Struggle for Culture

In Vladimir Nabokov’s 1947 novel Bend Sinister, a simple-minded supporter of the fanatical Average Man party, which has just taken power, describes the corruption and hypocrisy of the old regime: “Well, firstly, we were made to pay impossible taxes; secondly, all those Parliament ministers and…

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