Fear and Loathing in the Press Pack

An assortment of vids illustrating the stitch-ups and shut-outs of the corporate media, in case you hadn't noticed anything amiss. Got round to posting these as a result of Bensix's coverage of the media's non-coverage of the indoor pachyderm that is the Bilderberg Group's latest meeting.

First, a feature from BBC Radio 4's PM from 25 May 2011. Eddie Mair discusses press subservience with a sample of 4 hacks, the sample suitably diluted by the presence of fashion, sport and gossip correspondents. Ridicule is mentioned as a common means of keeping awkward correspondents in line, but another method, banning them, is also mentioned as what seems a pretty robust back-up plan.

(Quote from Humbert Wolfe.)

Next, a couple of clips of everyone's favourite cartoon neocon John Bolton throwing his weight around, illustrating the US approach to these matters. (He claims not to be a neocon, not sure on what grounds - the moustache perhaps.) Rajesh Mirchandani should be sacked for the very mildly challenging interview shown, apparently - the mind boggles as to what treatment the intrepid correspondent in the second segment merits.

And finally, a reporter daring to ask interesting questions of a politician is firmly rebuffed by members of the US media clique:

"We will never knowingly risk a civilian life" - ISAF

Lt-Col. Mark Wenham, speaking for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), enunciates a previously unknown rule of engagement for 'coalition' forces in Afghanistan. From an interview with Shaun Ley on The World at One, BBC Radio 4, 30th May 2011.

[UPDATE 24 Jun 2011: the LA Times reports an interesting response from Wenham's colleagues to what seems a reasonable request from the Afghan president:

Karzai said at a news conference in Kabul:  "This should be the last attack on people's houses. Such attacks will no longer be allowed."

His call was viewed as mainly symbolic. Western military officials cited existing cooperation with Afghan authorities and pledged to continue consultations, but said privately that Karzai's presidential authority does not include veto power over specific targeting decisions made in the heat of battle.

(via Glenn Greenwald, via Anonymous at Aaronovitch Watch)]

David Aaronovitch: expert on lies

Accountability depends on long memories. Alistair Campbell's performance over the Iraq war was transparently mendacious to rather a lot of us, but it's apparently only now, at a comfortable temporal distance, after he has 'moved on' and nothing is likely to be done about it, that his lies on behalf of the Blair government are being nailed down.

Major-General Michael Laurie, a former intelligence official involved in the dossier that's not already known as 'dodgy' and which was defended so passionately by 'tears on tap' Campbell has recently given evidence to the Chilcot inquiry:

In written evidence to the Chilcot inquiry, Maj-Gen Laurie rejected Mr Campbell's claim that the dossier was not intended to make the case for war: "This was exactly its purpose and these very words were used."

Among former and current members of the BBC news department, the comments were received yesterday with mixed feelings that combined a sense of vindication with anger at the way the organisation's journalism has been treated. Mr Marsh said he was unhappy with the implications by Lord Hutton in his 2004 report that the staff on Today had shown a lack of professionalism. "This vindicates our position and shows Hutton was wrong in criticising Andrew, criticising me and criticising the Today team," he said. "Just flat wrong." Rod Liddle, a former Today editor who hired Mr Gilligan, said: "These comments tell us what we knew already – that the BBC told the truth, Gilligan told the truth and Alastair Campbell's outrage was confected and it was a lie."

While we're revisiting old lies, it's worth having a quick shufti at what David Aaronovitch had to say about the dossier and the wider case (such as it was) for war. After all, Aaronovitch certainly seems to consider himself an authority on who is or isn't lying, as the ex cathedra pronouncements throughout his voodoo theories book bear witness.

So his expert opinion on this little matter? We weren't lied to.

That's bollocks of course, but perhaps Aaronovitch suffered from the same problem that, if he is to be believed, afflicted the Blair government: The government didn't deceive anybody over Iraq and WMD, but was misled itself. I couldn't possibly comment - let the reader be the judge.

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Prison Works (better with offender management and probation services, and not at all without them)

In the news: Longer prison sentences deter re-offending, study shows.


Yes, this is just one study, yes it seems to have been picked out for publicity by the Cons, yes it only looks at the effects on a specific individual of past punishment directed at them, more relevant to a 'short sharp shock' doctrine than a more general conception of prudential deterrence. But does it indeed show that longer prison sentences reduce reoffending - or in four-legs-good terms, that 'prison works'? Not really.


From the study, produced under the rubric of the DoJ's Compendium of reoffending statistics and analysis

Those sentenced to 1 to 2 years in custody had lower re-offending rates than those given sentences of less than 12 months – the difference in proven re-offending rates was 4.4 percentage points in 2008.


Custodial sentences of less than twelve months were less effective at reducing re-offending than both community orders and suspended sentence orders – between 5 and 9 percentage points in 2008. This reinforces the finding in the 2010 Compendium which was only based on 2007 data. The findings were similar for both community orders and suspended sentence orders.


The findings are not conclusive on whether the deterrent effect of longer custodial sentences is effective at reducing re-offending. Despite higher re-offending rates, offenders receiving sentences of less than 12 months do not have access to offender management programmes and are not subject to supervision by the Probation Service upon release. This latter factor is also likely to explain some of the difference between community sentences/suspended sentence orders and short prison sentences. However, the true impact of offender management programmes and Probation supervision cannot be reliably established using current Ministry of Justice administrative data.

I won't try to assess the multiplicity of considerations (e.g. small samples, arcane statuistical disputes) that may mean the study is of little or no value in showing anything. So, taking the report on its own terms:

• Sentences under one year are less effective at reducing reoffending than non-custodial sentences.
• Sentences under one year, which are not accompanied by offender management programmes and probation service supervision, are less effective than sentences between 1 and 2 years, which are.

From this we might infer that prison makes things worse, but supervision etc. is so effective that it more than compensates for that.

This doesn't address the matter of the comparison of 1-2 year sentences with 2-4 years, though. The report seems to show that the longer sentence is correlated with a lower reoffending rate (during the year after release). I'm not trying to rustle up some comprehensive rebuttal here - a study is a study, there is a large literature on these questions, and for all I know longer sentences in this range do have some effect on reoffending (how that happens is another question - there are many factors that might be involved, some of which might be achieveable without custodial sentences). I will permit myslef to say that longer stences fior the same offcne might reflect other factors which could in turn lead to closer supeervision in that post-release year - i.e. there might be an informal or less clearly-documented difference of the same kind as that already addressed.

But no further. Let the last word go to the report itself:

The findings from this paper are not conclusive on whether the deterrent effect of longer custodial sentences is effective at reducing re-offending.

Scarlett in the Black

John Scarlett, who as head of the JIC showed such independence in ensuring that nothing dodgy could get into any dossiers or anything like that, has now been appointed to the board of News International (Roy Greenslade, his background link.), which is supposedly meant to ensure the independence of the Times papers (you know, the ones hidden from the scrutiny of bloggers behind a paywall.)

Which for the most part a nice sinecure to add to his previous rewards in the shape of a brief stint as head of the SIS, and the consequent KCMG.

But the Eye (1283, 4 Mar 2011, p5) points out that this is splendid timing given that the Chilcott inquiry is going to be rolling out its bland admonishments soon, to be analysed in forensic detail by the News Corp titles, no doubt.

From the link supplied by Greenslade:

217. It is questionable how effective the Independent National Directors have been, even with the increased powers that Rupert Murdoch agreed to give them. The system was strongly criticised by Harold Evans who was Editor of The Sunday Times when Rupert Murdoch bought it, and who was then appointed as Editor of The Times. Mr Evans had fought for the increased powers of the Independent National Directors but in practice, he found they provided him with no effective protection. In his autobiography he wrote that none of the guarantees that Rupert Murdoch gave to safeguard editorial independence "are worth the paper they are written on—unless the proprietor shares the spirit of them. If he does, they are merely ornamental; if he does not, they are unworkable … Internal freedom cannot be acquired by external rules"[91]. Andrew Neil, Editor of The Sunday Times from 1983 to 1994, agreed "It was a conceit invented ... to allow Mr Murdoch to take over these papers in the first place, and it was put in place for that reason. It was not really put in place to protect the independence of the editors" (Q 1689).

I'm sure Scarlett will feel very much at home in such a setup, especially one run by the equally reputable Murdoch.

Cameron, the press and the Hello model

It's clear that the media have already anointed David Cameron, starting with the lionisation that greeted his (gasp!) memorising a speech. But it has now got to the point where they are collaborating in a transparent Hello-style publicity stunt, planned apology and all. All day yesterday Radio 4 news ran the story of Cameron's mild-swearing-on-the-radio 'gaffe' with no sign of scepticism, despite the fact that there can really be no doubt that the whole thing was planned in advance by Cameron and his spin machine. Apparently one of the freesheets mentioned the possibility that the mild swearing wasn't entirely inadvertent, but I haven't encountered any other mention of it even as a possibility - let alone a journo actually asking the direct question. The recording itself leaves little doubt that the 'profanity' was deliberate. Cameron very obviously worked his way up to his 'too many tweets make a twat' remark, which in itself is pretty clearly a prepared phrase. There were even preemptive giggles from one of his interlocutors, suggesting that even they were told in advance. At no point did Cameron show any sign of getting carried away. But quite general considerations make it quite unbelievable that this was anything but carefully choreographed. I'm trying to think of the last time I heard anyone accidentally swearing without being under he influence or involved in a thumb-hammering incident. It doesn't happen. Perhaps someone in an unfamiliar social situation, or someone who is inthe throes of strong emotion, but Cameron, the memoriser of speeches? It almost seems ridiculous to be commenting on this - but Cameron clearly thinks there is political capital to be gained from some quarter - and he's relying on not being directly challenged about, for example, the sincerity of his spokesman's apology. And it seems he can rely on the press in that regard.

Review of 'Counterknowledge' by Damian Thompson

Review of 'Counterknowledge' by Damian Thompson - Word version

Full text:

Book Review: Damian Thompson, Counterknowledge: How We Surrendered to Conspiracy Theories, Quack Medicine, Bogus Science and Fake History

London: Atlantic Books.

Hardcover: 1 Jan 2008, ISBN 978-1843546757;

Paperback: 1 Jul 2008, ISBN 978-1843546764.

I.

Young-earth creationists in the US have built a museum containing mechanised tableaux showing dinosaurs and humans in Flintstone-style coexistence. ‘Alternative’ therapies of no more medical value than sugar pills are available on the British National Health Service, with homoeopathic hospitals well-established and degree courses available in one of the new universities. In US academia, some ‘Afro-centric’ historians play fast and loose with facts in their attempt to construct a distinctively ‘black’ history which, according to at least one proponent, is teachable only by black people. Meanwhile, postmodernist literary and cultural theorists take it upon themselves to develop ill-conceived philosophical doctrines about the nature of truth and reality - and even in some cases to offer criticisms of such specialised fields as quantum physics.

Damian Thompson criticises all these trends, with copious footnotes and some theoretical discussion. He alerts the reader to many other putative instances of "counterknowledge" - glossed: "misinformation packaged as fact" (p1) - and decries the "casual approach to the truth"(pp12, 44) that underlies and sustains them. This seems a worthwhile project, and in reviews it attracts descriptions such as ‘timely’ and ‘much-needed’. These epithets are somewhat hyperbolic: this is only the latest addition to a substantial body of debunking literature, which goes back at least to Charles Mackay’s Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, first published in 1841.

To adapt a remark of Dr Johnson, while one expects to see it done, one is surprised that it is not done better. While many of Thompson’s points are correct as far as they go, the book’s defects are so numerous and glaring and themselves betray such a ‘casual approach to the truth’ that the reader could be forgiven for thinking that the word ‘Counterknowledge’ embossed across the front categorises its contents rather than defining its subject matter.

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A verifiable toljaso to ovine hacks

Compare this astute bit of analysis made three days after the event:

Last Updated: Friday, 19 May 2006, 16:03 GMT 17:03 UK
Why is Blair backing nuclear?
Analysis by Nick Assinder, Political Correspondent, BBC News website

...many in Westminster believe...he is engaged in a classic Alastair Campbell-style attempt to deflect attention...his remarks about the likely need for new nuclear power stations - which were, in fact, only a re-statement of his long-held position - came on the same day the cash-for-peerages affair took another twist and a new immigration row erupted. It has also been pointed out that early briefings from Downing Street on what was going to be in his speech made no mention of energy policy and that Mr Blair appears to have rushed forward debate on the policy several weeks before originally intended.

[ http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4989026.stm ]
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to this comment in response to BBC Political Editor's blog of 16 May, when Blair's announcement was first made:

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18. At 01:36 AM on 17 May 2006, Tim Wilkinson wrote:

No comment on the timing of this to knock the continiuing police investigation into high-level corruption out of the headlines? I would have expected some analysis on evening news programs of the latest developments - do I smell govt. lawyers? D-notices? Or is deference, inertia and a self-fulfilling belief in Blair's wriggling ability fuelling disbelief amongst the media?

[ http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/2006/05/changing_the_su_1.html ]

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Newsnight and all other TV news, the guardian, the times, all went with the obvious non-story instead of reporting the moment at which it started to look as though a serving Prime Minister might actually face criminal charges for corruption. Once the moment has passed and they have had time to think things over, they report Blair's 'brilliance' at manipulating the press with apparently no embarrassment at all.