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Great adverts of our time

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

When clicking through to a tale at Belgian daily Le Soir, Banca Monte Paschi Belgio caused a tree to grow out Bart de Wever's head, rather detracting from his message.

Given that Bart was accusing the newspaper in question of inciting hatred against the Flemish (like him...), one does wonder whether the ad placement was entirely accidental.

Those wishing to replicate the experiment will need to have a monitor resolution of 1280 x 768, Firefox or IE, and the patience to hit F5 a few times.

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Apology of the year

Sunday, June 22, 2008
From the South China Morning Post:

"A sincere apology to Carlson Tong Ka-shing for the serious error in this column last week. Mr Tong recently stepped down as chairman of the listing committee of the Hong Kong stock exchange, having served on the committee for six years, the maximum term permitted under the listing rules. This is what was originally written. Unfortunately, during the editing process, it was misinterpreted and erroneously reported as "Carlson Tong Ka-shing who has been jailed for six years", which is completely false".

(snigger)

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Happy the land that has no news

Saturday, June 21, 2008
To adapt Brecht.

Anyway, Finland would look to be the place to be in July, as this is what is showing at the site of Helsingin Sanomat, an English language site I have bookmarked:

"The International Edition will be offline for the whole of the month of July...Though there can be exceptions, July is not traditionally a very big month for "hard" news in Finland, either in politics or in business, as the country, too, is in recess, and is more or less "closed" for the duration".

Whereas we just have skateboarding ducks and so on heading the news agenda.

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Reds under the bed?

Wednesday, June 18, 2008
At the Department of 'Justice':

Mr. Maude: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many copies of the Morning Star (a) his Department and (b) each of its agencies procures on subscription each week; and at what cost.

Mr. Wills: The Ministry of Justice receives two copies of the Morning Star every day (Monday to Friday) at a cost of £6 per week.

If not at the Treasury:

Angela Eagle: The Treasury and each of its agencies do not subscribe to the Morning Star publication. (Nice grammar, Ange)


Or at No. 10: "...how many copies of the Morning Star (a) the Cabinet Office and (b) 10 Downing Street purchase each day".

Mr. Watson: None.

So, which of the DoJ squad are engaged in bet hedging, for when the revolution comes? Perm any two from Straw, Maria Eagle or the deeply obscure David Hanson, Michael Wills, 'Lord' Hunt or Bridget Prentice?

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Your cut out and keep guide to which papers are on the side of the angels

Friday, June 13, 2008
The Sun - "HAS David Davis gone stark raving mad? How else can we explain his silly act of self-styled martyrdom?...This was no noble cause. It was a shabby act of treachery. Mr Davis, a second-rate but ferociously ambitious politician, has not forgiven his rival for thrashing him in the Tory leadership race two years ago". So the hotline from No 10 to Nws Group still works.

The Mirror - "This brave gamble by a popular politician from a humble background will make him a hero to many and establish him as rival for the Tory crown". They must really hate / fear Cameron.

Express - No leader comment that I can find. Doubtless there are some micro celebrities in need of attention

Mail - No leader comment that I can find. Quentin Letts likes DD though.

Guardian - "He is right on ID cards, but only on the basis of an excessively sweeping mistrust of the state. The liberty he is concerned with is, almost exclusively, liberty from official interference. There is little place in this conception for freedom from destitution, for example, which only the state can provide". (C sticks his tongue into his lower lip and makes 'stupid' noises)

Independent - "we agree wholeheartedly with the trenchant opposition of the MP for Haltemprice and Howden to "the slow strangulation of fundamental British freedoms" that has taken place in recent years". Crikey.

Times - No leader comment. A dull item by Riddell I could not face.

Telegraph - Mixed, but finishes 'Mr Davis's resignation may have been reckless, misguided and highly disconcerting for the political establishment - but, driven by principle, it is none the less laudable for that'. If they had got it wrong I would be cancelling it today.

FT.com - "On the substance of these issues Mr Davis has right on his side. Pre-charge detention of up to 42 days remains unjustified: this was apparent all over again in Wednesday’s debate. Similarly, the case for curtailing personal freedoms to introduce ID cards has simply not been made. Too many civil liberties have already been taken away".

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French TV shocker - Formula One more popular than Trotskyism

Tuesday, May 13, 2008
At least judging by last weekend's viewing figures, with the Turkish GP attracting more viewers than an interview with my old mate Olivier Besancenot.

So far, so very so what. However, Besancenot has attracted the highest audience share for a politician so far this year, outdoing Ségolène Royal, Rachida Dati (the French equivalent of Jack Straw, if a great deal easier on the eye) and Simone Veil - still alive, amazingly enough. The interviewer is more of a Wogan / Jonathan Ross type than an Andrew Marr, from what I can divine.

However, the Trot postie has a long way to go before toppling Bernie Chirac as the most watched pol. She reaped a 27% share to his 20%. I was about to note that one would be hard pressed to find anything interesting to say about her, but apparently Mlle Chodron de Courcel's father was an Etonian, if my source is to believed. Can't say I am wholly convinced, actually.

Further digging has turned up this photograph at the Élysée's site, which I think deserves a fresh audience:




Captions welcome.....

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Meanwhile, in a parallel universe...

Thursday, April 17, 2008
..inhabited only by Mirror leader writers, this thought has occurred:

"A win for Labour's Ken Livingstone will be a devastating blow for Tory leader David Cameron. Questions will start to be asked about whether Cameron can deliver votes in the ballot box rather than just easy soundbites for the cameras. Murmurings of unrest among Conservative backbenchers will get louder".

The Mirror has never had any pretence to balance, let alone fairness in its op-eds (and to think people on the Left moan about the Mail....), but it does owe its readers something approaching nodding terms with reality.

So, such London-wide rule as there has been since the fall of Horace Cutler's GLC administration in 1981 has been by Labour. If Livingstone wins (kayn ayn hore), it will not be a surprise, still less 'a devastating blow' for Cameron as London has been a Left-leaning city for years, for reasons that I cannot see any value going into right now.

I think what they meant to say was this:

"A win for Conservative Boris Johnson will be a devastating blow for Labour leader Gordon Brown. Questions will again be asked about whether Brown can deliver votes at the ballot box rather than photo opportunities. Existing loud noises of unrest among Labour backbenchers will develop into open revolt".

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Something to note for future reference

Wednesday, April 09, 2008
Here is a chart 'borrowed' from tns-sofres.com, a French pollster (Merci...):


The figures in blue are the percentages of French folk judging that the political class cares what the people think, and the red the reverse. The only time an absolute majority have felt listened to was in September 1977, under the less than man o' the people President Giscard, and - rather worryingly - anti-semite Raymond Barre. Disillusionment has been highest under Sarko / Fillon (now) and under the unspeakably vile Mitterand and the, tiptoeing around the laws of defamation, less than brilliant Édith Cresson.

Anyway, considering how supine the French media is, no-one can seriously accuse the meeja of undermining faith in the political process, so given the Gauls view their pols with such a high degree of cynicism, mull on that the next time some odious fraud from the Labour party attacks the media.

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Great corrections of our time

Monday, April 07, 2008
From Hina, the Croatian news agency:

'Please note that the first sentence of the news item headlined 'Residents of Zagreb best joke-tellers in Croatia - survey' should read correctly: 'Residents of Zagreb are the most successful in telling jokes in Croatia', according to a survey [in] the Croatian edition of Reader's Digest recently conducted'.

I can just imagine that Hina was deluged with e-mails from Outraged of Osijek and Disgusted of Daruvar moaning that they told much funnier jokes than Zagrebites, and the Reader's Digest tale had been horribly distorted. Furthermore, perhaps the good people of Split, Pula or wherever are much better than Zagrebites at telling jokes when not in Croatia?

I do wonder how they measured success in joke telling. Remembering the punch line? Not telling jokes reliant upon knowledge of recherché sexual practices when trying to amuse maiden aunts? Volume of laughter? Duration of laughter?

Any Croat jokes (in translation...) would be gratefully received. At one point I was doing a re-write of Lear's 'Old man with a beard' limerick involving sundry Balkan nationalities, but it never got beyond private beta testing because it was not very funny.

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Clare Short will be pleased

Wednesday, March 05, 2008
The one thing that people who care not one jot about politics know about Clare Short is that she does not like photographs of underclad women in tabloid newspapers. Or at least she did not, as she has not had much to say about the subject since '86.

Anyway, the Danish equivalent of our own dear super soaraway Sun, Ekstra Bladet, is ditching page three, or in its case page nine, girls. So far, so not very interesting, but in a development that is howlingly funny, "Starting Wednesday, the paper's page 9 will instead be dedicated to women's issues featuring advice, comments and letters".

Anyone would think that the likes of Toynbee, Campbell (B), Bunting et al (or Nordic equivalents) had stormed the building, tarred & feathered the management and instigated a new editorial line, but apparently not: "Although the new page 9 will be dedicated to women's issues, there are as yet no women on Ekstra Bladet's management staff".

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Nonsense on stilts. With a Jimmy Bonnet, a red nose and Spock ears

Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Nos amis les Français are intent on outdoing the Swedes for silliness, and I do believe we have a winner for the day. However, the Ides of January has come, but it has not past....

And this piece of folly? Laurent 'Infected blood scandal' Fabius wants balance in television news / current affairs coverage written into the constitution. And how does he propose to do this? By the use of a stopwatch. Yes, really, and he has started a petition (maybe he should try his luck at No.10, it does not have a particularly onerous door policy) to that effect:

"The balance of our democracy is undermined by the fact of the the President of the Republic and his advisers' considerable speaking time in the media not being accounted for. This is why we require that a constitutional provision be adopted, which imposes compliance with a true rule of the three thirds for the television appearances: a third for the president of the Republic, his collaborators and the government, a third for the majority, and a third for the forces of opposition".

The French equivalent of Ofcom has already shot down similar proposals because 'the President...does not speak in the name of a party or a political group'. In the meantime, the current - and equally idiotic - rule will continue: thirds for government, majority, opposition.

During the Sego /Sarko debate of last year, I noted similar egg timer shenanigans: "Both of them are being subject to a digital egg timer so precise times speaking to the nation are equal. SR got a second for saying 'bon soir'. Yes really".

I suspect that Fabius has the raging hump because Sarko beat him to the Elysee (LF was third after Sego and DSK among the Socialists), and has a rather nice looking young lady on his arm, whereas Fabius appears to have remained a less than jolly bachelor since his divorce.

In his favour, I will grant that his response to a magazine's question, 'what would you like God to say to you, if he exists?' is really rather good:

"Welcome my son. Make yourself comfortable. You have done well. Now you can go and find your friends. And you will never be short of time for them".

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