“Whenever the wind stops howling over the mountains of Tora Bora, a deep, rich chuckle can presumably be heard echoing down the valleys. If he is still alive, nobody will be enjoying the plight of America more than Osama bin Laden. The anarchic carnage in the American financial and political system brings in sight a humiliating withdrawal and defeat in Afghanistan and Iraq. It even raises the possibility of the final collapse of the evil empire which Osama forecast.” British columnist Neil Lyndon

If you cant win em join em. Now that you have tried the rest, try the best—

—presenting The American Taliban. The US and UK have reviewed their strategies and plans and come up with a peace plan for Afghanistan. Only time will tell if the Americans will be smoking the peace pipe with the Taliban, but according to press reports the Saudis are playing a significant role in brining the Taliban and Karzai together.

Mr. Karzai has been a total failure. NATO and ISAF have failed to achieve its objectives. The economies of all Western countries are in a free fall. The Neocons sit discredited and maligned, seeking cover under new garb. Islampphobic Guiliani and Tancredo ware rejected by the electorate.

Before the American drones make space for Peace doves in Afghanistan, before the Olive Trees begin blossoming there is time to take stock of the crisis.

A few tactonic events have taken place in West Asia that has led to the new peace initiative:

1) Taking advantage of the confusion in the fledgling new coalition government in Pakistan, the US landed troops into FATA testing the resolve of the Pakistan Army. The Pakistan Army fired at the forces and apparently brought down one helicopter.

… Islamabad halted all fuel shipments to US forces in Afghanistan in the aftermath of a cross-border attack by US special forces in South Waziristan last month. “Any sustained interruption of supplies would seriously hamper our ability to operate in Afghanistan because 80% of the logistical support for the US military operating in Afghanistan flows through Pakistan,” it said, noting that Washington should explore alternative supply routes into Afghanistan in the event that ties with Islamabad worsen. ” Pakistan Policy Working Group” of the government-supported US Institute of Peace (USIP): The Next Chapter: The United States and Pakistan”.

2) A strong of RAW inspired suicide bombings, the rise of Indian agent, Bait Mehsud, and the bombing of the Islamabad Marriott by RAW agents of Indian agents disguised as Al-Qaeda brought the Americans to the clear understanding that things were getting out of control in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

3) The total ineffectively of the Karzai government to control any major chunk of Afghanistan or even Kabul.

4) The inability of NATO and ISAF to defeat and reverse the tide of the 39 insurgent groups that control a major section of Afghanistan.

5) The Financial and economic crisis that has forced Britain to withdraw from Iraq and cannot continue to transfer the forces from one theater of war (Iraq) to another (Afghanistan).

6) NATO and ISAF refused to be drawn into the Cambodiazation of the Afghan war–namely the incursion into Pakistan.

What are the implications of a Taliban ruling Afghanistan? The Removal of Musharraf was a pivotal in putting in place the new strategy.

The report argues that the advent of a civilian-led government in Islamabad during the past year and ultimately the resignation of former president General Pervez Musharraf, combined with the forthcoming change of administrations in the US, marks an important opportunity for Washington “to rethink its entire approach to Pakistan”. Pakistan Policy Working Group” of the government-supported US Institute of Peace (USIP): The Next Chapter: The United States and Pakistan”.

It all came tumbling down. For the past decade the US has attempted to create new realities in Afghanistan. It now thinks that it has sufficiently destroyed the old structures that were in place. It may be grossly mistaken about this. After all the US is only influential in cantonments and US bases. The policy makers may not understand the deep roots of affinity that run between the Pakhtuns. The Paktuns make up a significant part of the Pakistani Army and the Pakhtuns are very influential in the government. With Zardari in power, the US may feel that the tentacles of the ISI may not be as deep as they used to be. In its naivete, the US may feel that the ISI has been defanged. The status quo has been disrupted and now the Americans want a new breed of Taliban to take over Kabul. Afghanistan has now once again been declared an area of influence of Pakistan. It has taken the a decade to acknowledge the fact that the Taliban cannot be defeated.

India with dreams of super power status is the biggest loser in this peace deal. The 107 consulates should be packing their bags. One cannot imagine any circumstance where the current level of Indian influence has any staying power in Afghanistan. The 10,000 Indian soldiers ostensibly there to protect their construction workers will have to go back where they came from. The construction work will be slowed down and wound up. The Indian presence follow the same residence that allowed Lord Curzon to pursue a policy of On to the Oxus, but had to retreat after the defeats at Maiwand etc. The Indian delegation had to pack up its bags and leave Kabul after the Soviets left Afghanistan. A similar fate awaits India.

Pakistan will have to tread carefully. An overly aggressive policy in Afghanistan will rankle many of the powers to be. Slowly but surely, the Durand Line has to be erased, and the inevitable union between Afghanistan Pakistan will emerge.

The basic implication is that most of the NATO and ISAF forces will withdraw from Afghanistan. When the Soviets withdrew it took the Afghans a decade to purge Afghanistan of the remnants of a decade long Soviet Occupation. It may take the Afghans a bit longer. Mr. Karzai surely will either be hanging from the nearest tree or enjoying life on one of the islands that he has purchased for himself.

The long term interests of the US may or may not be secure in Kabul. For a decade it has tried itself and tried to use the Indians in controlling Kabul. Both policies have failed miserably. Now the US has not only acknowledged the role of Pakistan in Afghan affairs, it is now using the good offices of Pakistani politicians to broker a peace agreement between the warring factions. This is exactly the agreement that Pakistan has been espousing for more than a decade. This was the agreement to which the Taliban had agreed to in September 2001. However at the time “Imperial Hubris” did not allow the Neocon policy makers to listen to sanity. The American Tin ear did not listen to the sagacious advice given to Washington by Islamabad. Pakistani advice was ignored and Afghanistan and Iraq were bombed to smithereens. Sadly in doing so the US actually strengthened Anti-Americanism in the world.

Having learnt their lesson the Russians have tried to stay out of the conflict in West Asia. Now the Chinese and the Russians will vie for access to warm waters.

Various American and British newspapers are already reporting on the peace deal.

Against the backdrop of a string of suicide bombings in Pakistan, British, American, and United Nations officials are grappling with the idea of a negotiated settlement with the Taliban. Christian Science Monitor October 6th, 2008

Mr Karzai said his envoys had travelled to Saudi -Arabia and neighbouring Pakistan to try to kick-start negotiations that are increasingly seen as the only solution to the violent insurgency gripping Afghanistan. The Financial Times

The chorus about the defeat in Afghanistan is now plastered all over the media. Perception is reality. The reality has caught up with the perception of the war in Afghanistan.

The departing commander of British forces in Afghanistan says he believes the Taleban will never be defeated. Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith, the commander of 16 Air Assault Brigade… told The Times

that in his opinion, a military victory over the Taliban was “neither feasible nor supportable.”…He indicated that the only way forward was to find a political solution that would include the Taliban. The Sunday Times

The defeat in Afghanistan is complete. Only the announcement is left. Well now the announcement also just came in. The war in Afghanistan is over—Now there is a plethora of news stories endorsing the writings.

ISLAMABAD (AFP) — Former Pakistani premier Nawaz Sharif is willing to broker talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban, his spokesman said Tuesday, amid reports that Sharif is already playing a key role.

The offer came after a Pakistani newspaper reported that Sharif, in conjunction with Saudi Arabia, is helping to seek a settlement between the hardline Taliban and the US-backed regime of President Hamid Karzai. AFP October 6th, 2008

The story of Afghanistan and colonialism begins a long time ago. British tried to take up White Man’s burden in Afghanistan.

NATO Lessons: 1880 UK defeat at Maiwand-Afghanistan

NATO Lessons: 1880 UK defeat at Maiwand-Afghanistan
Is NATO committing suicide in Afghanistan.
NATO lessons: UK defeat at Maiwind may shed some light on today’s situation.

1) There are news items that Iran has been helping some of the insurgent anti-American groups in Afghanistan–most specifically there are reports that Iran has been supporting Gulbadin Hikmatyar.

2) The US has been pressuring NATO and ISAF to help the US in a Iraq-like surge in Afghanistan? The UK has made it clear that it is in no position to support the war in Iraq and is withdrawing its troops from Iraq next year. The redeployment of those forces to Afghanistan is no longer economically feasible for the United Kingdom.

3) In response to the growing pressure, various American, UN and British commanders have publicly announced that “the war in Afghanistan is not winnable.

4) The Saudis were pressured by the US to assist in brining Mr. Karzai and the Taliban to the “peace table”.

5) Mr. Nawaz Sharif the ex-Prime Minister of Pakistan and the Opposition Leader was the bridge between Mr. Karzai and the representatives of Mullah Omar

6) Apparently the US has agreed to the Taliban coming back to power on the condition that they sever the links with Al-Qaeda

7) The Taliban have demanded that they will only participate in a government if the NATO, ISAF, and US occupation forces are withdrawn from the Hindu Kush

SOLUTIONS FOR AFGHANS Saving the Pashtuns of Afghania from Afghanistan. Eradicating the Pashtun plight and ending occupation.

Nawaz mediating between Taliban, Karzai

ISLAMABAD: PML-N Quaid Nawaz Sharif is playing a key role in conjunction with Saudi Arabia in bringing about a negotiated settlement between the Taliban and the Karzai regime to pave the way for withdrawal of the US and Nato forces from Afghanistan.
“It was for this precise reason that the PML-N chief has put off his departure from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan for another two days,” an informed source told The News. According to his new programme, the PML-N chief will return home on Tuesday.

“Nawaz Sharif was invited by Saudi King Abdullah and he undertook the present visit to stay in Saudi Arabia for nearly two weeks to talk about the nitty-gritty of the peace process,” the source said.

The day the PML-N chief landed in Saudi Arabia, he had a 90-minute meeting with the Saudi monarch, the source said, adding different national and regional issues, particularly the ongoing wave of terrorist attacks in Pakistan and bloodshed in Afghanistan, were discussed in detail.

According to a US media report on Monday, secret peace talks have been held between the Afghan government and the Taliban in the Saudi Kingdom. Both sides agreed to resolve the Afghan issue through dialogue, it said.

While PML-N leaders, closely working with Nawaz Sharif, were aware of Nawaz Sharif’s objective behind his extended stay in Saudi Arabia, sources close to President Asif Zardari were oblivious of the PML-N chief’s “role” and “efforts” in bringing the warring sides on the negotiating table.

“Nawaz Sharif is serving as a bridge,” one political source said and added the PML-N chief is an “old hand” on Afghanistan. During his two stints as prime minister, Nawaz Sharif had developed good working relations with almost all the Afghan Mujahideen leaders, who were now largely irrelevant because of the fighting strength of the Taliban.

The source referred to the March 1993 Islamabad accord, which eight Afghan Mujahideen leaders had signed because of Nawaz Sharif’s efforts.Nawaz Sharif stayed just a few days in Pakistan after his return from Britain and then flew into Saudi Arabia. In London, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband had a meeting with him in which Nato forces’ operations in Afghanistan and constant failures to control the situation figured prominently.

Sources believed that the Saudi initiative in which Nawaz Sharif had his own role has the backing of Washington and London.A British general has been quoted as saying that the war in Afghanistan can’t be won. Additionally, there have been reports of willingness of Washington and London for holding talks with the Taliban, especially after the incapacitation of the Karzai regime.

NATO needs 400,000 soldiers in Afghanistan. According to British and American General, even that would not be enough to defeat the Taliban. No country or group of countries have that amount of manpower to spare. The financial crisis in America and Europe makes it virtually impossible for the UK to send in an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan. The Europeans and NATO is unable and unwilling to continue the war in Afghanistan.

There is not military solution to the Afghan quagmire. We have been advocating a more comprehensive solution for a decade. Replacing Mr. Karzai with Zalmay Khalilzad is like moving the deck chairs on the Titanic. The whole game is over. The US and European media too busy with the US elections has still not caught up with the reality of the fiasco in Kabul. The end is near.

Rupee News for several years has proposed that the Pakhtun areas of Afghanistan should be handed over to the Pakistani military and NATO and ISAF should leave Pakistan. Now this is affirmed by some American Thinktanks. Saving the Pashtuns of Afghania from Afghanistan. Eradicating the Pashtun plight and ending occupation. (http://rupeenews.com/2008/01/31/saving-pashtuns-of-old-afghanistan-in-afghania-eradicating-pashtun-plight-ending-occupation/)

Solution: ‘Pakistani boots’ on the ground inside Afghanistan (http://rupeenews.com/2008/09/06/solution-%e2%80%98pakistani-boots-on-the-ground-inside-afghanistan/)…a more compliant president Zardari will work with the new Afghan president Zalmay Khalilzad (expected to win the next elections in Afghanistan). Zalmay Khalilzad and Asif Zardari have been involved in a long term tet-a-tet even before the murder of Ms. Benzair Bhutto. Solution: ‘Pakistani boots’ on the ground inside Afghanistan

The Sunday Times reported yesterday (5 October 2008) that the Singapore Badminton has re-hired Zheng Qingin as its technical director on a four-year contract - even after the former China national coach was convicted of two counts of corruption in the Singapore courts last year.

Zheng was fined $20,000 for accepting bribes of $6,000 from former national coach and fellow China national You Guangli. He collected $3,000 in January 2004 as a reward for recommending You as chief coach and another $3,000 in February 2005 for recommending that You's contract be extended for two years.

SBA chief executive officer Edwin Pang referred all media queries to SBA president Lee Yi Shyan who did not respond to the queries by press time.

However, Singapore Sports Council CEO Oon Jin Teik said:  "The man has already been found guilty and paid his dues...He has good technical ability and I'm certain he can contribute to local badminton further."

You can read the full report here.

My thoughts:

I was quite appalled when I read this report.

Firstly, what I don't understand is this: given the SBA's extensive network and contacts, was Zheng Qingjin the BEST and ONLY candidate for the job?

Surely not, right?

I am certain that there are many other suitable candidates that the SBA could have considered for the task of getting Singapore into the Thomas and Uber Cup finals by 2012.

Look, every year, top players retire. Subsequently, they re-emerge as coaches. Now, couldn't the SBA have considered all these other former top shuttlers as possible high performance coaches or technical directors?

Look at the Badminton Association of Malaysia: over the past 15 years, it has shown a bold and pioneering sense of imagination by hiring the likes of former Chinese great Han Jian (who led the country to Thomas Cup success in 1992), Danish legend Morten Frost (who was according to a newspaper report, paid RM$50,000 a month), former Indonesia coach Indra Gunawan, former South Korean doubles ace Park Joo Bong  to take charge of their national squads.

Currently, former Indonesian Olympic doubles champion Rexy Mainaky is the BAM's high performance coach.

And clearly, Malaysian badminton has been the richer for it. Just look at all the successes and top players it has produced over the years under the tutelage of these former badmnton greats.

If the BAM can scour around the region and the world for former top players to coach and guide their national squads, then why can't the SBA do the same? 

Even the Singapore Sports School has shown more imagination than the SBA in this respect - I have it on good authority that the School even held preliminary discussions with Park to get him on board as its coach when it first started out but couldn't meet his salary demands in the end.

Given the fact that the Singapore dollar is pretty strong compared to the currencies of these other countries, surely it can't be that difficult to make an attractive offer to any of these top ex-shuttlers or coaches to come on board and take on the challenge of turning our national squads into perennial members of the Thomas and Uber Cups by 2012?

Instead, we've gone ahead and re-hired a 65-year-old man whose reputation is in tatters, who has a chequered past and who, apparently according to The Sunday Times report, also has health problems.

Sure, the facts cannot deny that Zheng is probably a very good coach.

After all, he was Coach of the Year in 2005.  And during his previous tenure as technical director from 2002 to 2006, he led Singapore badminton to several notable achievements on the international stage.

These included transforming Ronald Susilo into one of the world's top 10 players and leading the women's team to the SEA Games gold in 2003 and the Asian Games bronze in 2006.

But surely, all this cannot mean that there are no other equally or more suitable candidates than Zheng around. 

I would really be interested in hearing from the SBA the lengths it went to look for someone to fill the technical director's position. Because Zheng's appointment looks like a joke right now. A bad one at that.

There was one more paragraph in The Sunday Times report which really made my blood boil. It read like this:

"Queries to SBA chief executive officer Edwin Pang were referred to his president, Lee Yi Shyan."

In other words, when contacted by the media, Pang decided to let his president do all the explaining.

Good grief. How thoroughly embarrassing. And how completely lacking in guts and courage.

This is really poor form by Pang.

If Pang doesn't even have the guts to face up to questions from the media about a small controversy like Zheng's appointment, then it's time he starts asking himself whether he is the right man for the job, or whether the title of chief executive officer is an appropriate one for him.

Perhaps he should consider changing his designation to "Chief Admin Officer" or "Chief Clerk" instead. It really sounds like an apt and more appropriate description and job title given the way he has reacted to this situation.

Bottom line: If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.

If this is the sort of leadership at the helm of Singapore badminton - one that is clearly bereft of ideas and strong and bold leadership - then I am not holding out very much hope for the sport's future on the international stage.

Yours in sport

Singapore Sports Fan

• I never settled on minimalism - that was attributed to me. I'm completely against categorisation. It doesn't allow anyone to see or feel what they might be able to experience. It takes away the emotions.
• I don't separate work and life, which is a blessing. I don't have to divide my time into something I like more and something I like less.
• I need time to be alone. For me, a waste of time is the most productive time.

Categorisation/compartmentalising

It has been said to me on many an occasion, 'I am very good at compartmentalising' and I tend to reply: 'Yeah, me too, I'm great at that'. LIE... I am rubbish at that. Everything I experience has an effect on everything else. I am hedonistic in that way. I like to indulge in experience, that sounds potentially rude/disastrous, but I don't mean it like that. I mean that I love meeting interesting people, talking to them and indulging myself in discovering new things through them - be that worky stuff or social.

It does mean that I can be a complete bore at dinner parties (talking about work) and sometimes at work I go off on a complete tangent - because it interests me and the person I am talking to has an enthusiasm that piques something in me.

I have often felt guilty about this, seen it as a lack of discipline that I respect in others. It has not helped in my attempt to define my online 'brand', how I present a professional front whilst retaining the Emma bit that people invest in. But I take comfort from Helmut's observation that by categorising everything, you take away the emotion - emotion can be good, well lack of it is very definitely bad. So, I am going to stop feeling so guilty and see what happens.

Separating work and life

This is a forever problem for me. I love my work, really love my work. I also happen to love my life - most of the time! I struggle to find the dividing line between the two. I do run my own business and my business is me - as in, I have my own consulting business (but that sounds a bit too wanky).

I happened upon my line of work by doing what I loved, explaining stuff to people in a way that they would 'get it' and would feel good about 'getting it', not stupid, but informed.

I don't do this at home, but what I do do at home is what comes naturally to me, being a Mother of two girls aged 11 and 6. This I love, as much as I love my day job. (I know, lucky me).

So, I don't want to stop one to be the the other and how can I? I can't stop being Mum and it seems unnatural to me to stop being 'work me' when I am home being Mum.

This leads to the scary blurring of lines as explained in my latest post about twitter. And this I need to work on.

Being alone and wasting time

I have always valued being alone. As long as I can remember I have been the 'geek girl' the one who sits absorbed in books, 'living in my own world' or just alone. I love that time in my own head. Recently I have found my way back to it through running. Living life as a working Mother brings little solitude, at least little solitude without guilt! The perambulatory needs of my dog has created a wonderful opportunity for me to get at least half an hour a day to myself.

Wasting time: now this I do online. It does often seem as if I am wasting time when on here; but I never am. I am either learning or communicating - often both. And this is also important! Again there is the guilt thing. If I am on my computer, I am not doing something else that needs doing, therefore is it a waste of time?

I don't know, I really don't and as I write this I begin to feel the edges of guilt creeping in.

So, twitter et al

In this post I have been brutally honest. And I feel as if I am wasting your reading time because I do not yet know the answer to balancing work and life. But I do know that there are no defining lines and I am trying to find my own balance.

I do know that my use of twitter has had a detrimental effect on my own life: for example I started to text my friends and acquaintances as if they were on twitter. Passing on titbits of information that I found fascinating about my life and wanted to share - twitter stylee - regardless of their wish or need to know this information. Wrong! Sorry gang, you know who you are, and actually most of you don't read my blog. :)

Somehow a line needs to be drawn, I think it is a very wobbly line, that frees up my ability to keep learning and sharing, but protects my friends from my tendency to over-communicate the stuff I am not sharing at work.

You see, it is not my professional life that I need to protect - that is enhanced by my overt nature and mind that loves to learn and thrives on other people. It is my personal life and my friends who suffer. I need to work on this.

Nothing is trickier than teenage romance. Just ask 18-year-old Bella Swan, entangled in a love triangle with the coolest guy in class and a rebel hunk. And oh yes, the former just happens to be a vampire while the latter is a werewolf, making them mortal enemies.

Bella finally makes her choice in Breaking Dawn, the fourth and last installment of the best-selling supernatural Twilight series. She marries Edward Cullen, born in 1901 and preserved forever in a gorgeous 17-year-old vampire-strong body that can crush trees and stop traffic.

Jacob Black grudgingly gives his blessings but then snatches it back when he realises the happy couple are going on a "real" honeymoon -  a cute euphemism for the events leading to Bella becoming pregnant with a mystertious, ominous foetus.

Not to give anything away, but Bella does not die from the pregnancy. It is not even the most dangerous thing to happen to her in the book.

Here is a clue: The Volturi, the vampire world's ruling family, pays a long-threatened, deadly visit to the Cullens. But the final showdown, despite lots of tense build-up, is actually quite a letdown.

Breaking Dawn continues the readability of the most popular fantasy series since Harry Potter, but somehow loses the magic of the first three books.

Part of it is the sudden change in perspective in the middle section of the book from Bella's narration to Jacob's which is bland at best and draggy at its worst.

Its main problem, though, is the lack of realism that screams authorial laziness. Sure, vampires and werewolves cohabit in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere. I can even believe, sort of, in vampire sperm (ewww).

But to have the vampires suddenly unearth not just one, but two, secret weapons against the Volturi is too much for my mortal mind. I will not give away the most unrealistic event of all, but it is a grimace-worthy turn.

Twilight fans looking for an action-packed read, however, can settle in for a good time.

What do you think of the review? Is 3 out of 5 stars a worthy vote for Breaking Dawn?

Over the last few months we have been working with a number of clients from the UK, USA and South Korea helping them with their strategy and how to engage their consumers in a digital world.

In addition to this we have also been doing a huge amount of 'housework' to help us with the expansion of Bletchley Group over the coming months. We have launched a new website at www.bletchleygroup.com but are working on a update to the content to better reflect what we do and the services we offer clients going forward.

We have finally found our PR team although this took us significantly longer than we hoped or expected but we pride ourselves on giving a first class service and so it was vitally important that we have the correct team in place to achieve this. I'm glad to say we now have this in place. Look out for some press releases in the near future.

Also I'm extremely please to say that News International specifically The Sunday Times are now a client.

Unfortunately I can't mention the project just yet but we are working to help them launch a new initiative. Our remit is very wide ranging, we are currently preparing a full scoping document including; the proposition, positioning, the brand, the supply chain, fulfilment partners, e-commerce, legal and finance. It's a brilliant project and will be an excellant case study to show our full range of services, once we can tell everyone about it.

Namely, poor Ms Palin junior. Perez seems to want to burn her at the proverbial stake - but where does this all fit in with privacy? Are we not entitled to respect for our private and family lives? Because her mother is a public figure, is she? EU law would say no; American law has more respect for freedom of expression which, confronted with these kinds of "reporting", may not be all that great a thing.

Vogue India has come under fire for publishing images, in a fashion spread, of ordinary Indians wearing extraordinary clothing - clothing that costs upwards of 1000% of their daily incomes. Vogue claims that it is not attempting to make any kind of statement; that the clothing speaks for itself, and that fashion now transcends class divides. But the Vogue family (see Steven Meisel of Vogue Italia fame) are not necessarily new to controversy, nor to attempts to split popular opinion at the seams. It will be interesting to see where this leads; here they have used not only ordinary people, instead of models - they have left them in their ordinary habitats, we see their ordinary lives, their ordinary faces. And really, there's nothing ordinary about them at all, even when juxtaposed with Hermes' latest creation.

And that's pretty much it. My lazy linking begins here - in that, I shan't be linking. But this Sunday's Sunday Times had a hilarious article by Mr Gill on the Democratic convention, and Ariel Leve had a (as usual) thought-provoking piece about women on death row. Una's had a makeover in the "new-look" Tribune magazine (style, little substance....) and Duffy's in there, again, being "cute". Does she ever do anything else?

In other news, watch this space for Star Little Thing's latest release (come on, buy Irish!), and for me to get back on the blogging track and hopefully offend a few more people. Fingers crossed, loike.

Sizing up the sex of the Master
In your imitation Barbour,
Thighs moistening in the morning,
You didn’t notice them turn.

Fascinated by the divinely
Handsome Captain’s white breeches
And dulled by fine wines,
The shouted warning went unheard.

In a blur of pads, paws, snouts,
Teeth and tails they fell upon you
And whilst most found it bizarre
And somewhat unpleasant that you should be
Ripped apart by hunting dogs,
Me, I tend to agree with
The verdict reported by the
Reynard Post the following day:

“The whole spectacle was
Brilliantly Exciting and challenging”

Written in response to an assertion by a Sunday Times Journalist (many years ago) that a fox-hunt she had witnessed was "brilliantly exciting and challenging".

"Last weekend two prominent newspaper columnists [Swaminathan Aiyar in The Sunday Times, and Vir Sanghvi in The Hindustan Times] wrote about the need to think out-of-the-box urging us to seriously consider if it is morally right to hold "unwilling" Kashmiris back in this country.

"I agree with them.... But under no circumstances can Indian citizens be allowed to promote secession.

"Advocating the right of Kashmiris to secede, as a professional female agitator [Arundhati Roy] (who believes the Vajpayee Government staged the December 13, 2001 attack on Parliament) reportedly did in Srinagar, is tantamount to treason and must invite provisions contained in the law relating to waging war against the State.

"Personally, I feel that even publicising such treasonable views, leave alone using dedicated columns to indulge in secessionist propaganda, should invite the charge of promoting terrorism and anti-national activity."

Read the full column: Better Mush than traitors

De Britse interne contraspionage- en veiligheidsdienst MI5 wil actief homo's rekruteren. Dat is opmerkelijk, want tot begin jaren 1990 werden homo's geweerd omdat ze gechanteerd zouden kunnen worden om hun geaardheid. MI5 werkt voor de wervingscampagne met belangengroep Stonewall.

Britse geheime dienst wil homo’s werven, Telegraaf.nl, 17.08.2008.
“Mensen uit minderheidsgroepen weten hoe ze moeten omgaan met mensen die anders zijn,” zei Ben Summerskill van de homolobbygroep Stonewall, die is ingeschakeld voor de wervingsactie. “Ze weten ook hoe ze iets moeten doen zonder op te vallen.”

MI5 werft sinds september 2001 massaal nieuwe mensen aan. Het personeelsbestand steeg van 1.500 naar 3.500 medewerkers, waaronder moslims, islamologen, mensen die Aziatische talen spreken en nu ook holebi's.

Coming-out bij MI5 lag vroeger moeilijk, omdat dit impliceerde dat holebi's logen tijdens hun selectie. Niet meteen het beste idee als je voor de geheime diensten wil werken.

Voor de petite histoire: Ben Summerskill van Stonewall ging naar dezelfde school als MI5-directeur Jonathan Evans.

Perhaps the most revealing column is by Cole Morton, writing in the Independent (perhaps my favorite of all the British publications).   In a piece entitled "Obama on Tour: Three Special Relationships in One Day," Morton writes this interesting passage:

When Barack Obama arrived at No 10 yesterday, he looked happy, relaxed and pleased to be there. He smiled and waved to photographers on the other side of Downing Street, calling a cheery, "Hello!" Camera flashes caught Gordon Brown waiting for him in the shadows of the hallway.

But when the US presidential candidate came out again two hours later, after a long chat with the beleaguered Prime Minister, he looked shattered. The smile had faded. Now he spoke so softly that only the closest microphones could hear him. As usual, the cut of his sharp, dark suit echoed the Kennedy era, but the charisma had drained away.

He had no advice for Mr Brown. But he did have an observation. "You're always more popular before you're actually in charge of things," he said. "Once you're responsible, you're going to make some people unhappy."

In case you haven't heard, Gordon Brown is in a very precarious position at this moment. There are rumors of moves by his own party to have him removed. (Echoes of the forces that worked against Hillary Clinton?)

Morton goes on to say:

Afterwards Barack said their chat had been "wonderful". But after the euphoria of Berlin and the glory of Paris, his Washington entourage was shocked to be made to sit outside on the tarmac. One said the White House would never be allowed to look as tatty as the grimy No 10. In one window the nets had been pushed aside for a cardboard packing case. The symbolism was unfortunate.

The senator talked about Afghanistan and Iraq, climate change and the credit crunch, saying some problems were best solved together. Was there still a special relationship? "Absolutely." He paid tribute to British troops. Then he seemed to lose interest.

If he lost interest on this visit, what's he going to do if he has a hard morning in the Oval Office? And isn't his staff just "precious" about their horror of waiting out in the street and being put off by the less-than-grand 10 Downing Street?

Meanwhile, the Telegraph has the results of a new poll on the public's attitude to David Cameron, the Conservative leader.

The first detailed analysis of the public’s perception of the Conservative leader reveals that his popularity is increasing rapidly but there is still concern over his substance and ability to connect with ordinary people.

(snip)

Today’s poll found that half of the British public regarded the Conservative leader as a “lightweight” with 44 per cent of those questioned saying he is “not in touch with ordinary people”. Only 27 per cent of people describe Mr Cameron as “deeply serious” with 39 per cent saying he is “somewhat shallow”.

Mr Brown and Labour have repeatedly accused Mr Cameron, a former public relations executive, of being a “shallow salesman”.

However, the poll also finds that the Conservative leader is increasingly popular with the public and his strategy of moving the party away from its nasty image is beginning to work.

"Lighweight" but "increasingly popular"....  Sound familiar? And a forrmer PR guy as Prime Minister?  WOW!

In the Sunday Times, Richard Wood details the Obama-Cameron encounter in his piece, "Barack Obama: He Came. He Saw. He, er, Left."

The two met outside in New Palace Yard. The senator placed a hand on Cameron’s shoulder, and Cameron gestured up at Big Ben, an image of old and new, power and changing times that probably had Brown gnashing teeth and biting nails all at once.

Cameron rammed home the point that he’s the same sort of new kid on the block by giving Obama a selection of CDs by the Smiths, Radiohead and Gorillaz.

For more than an hour Obama talked with Cameron, overrunning his allotted time as they discussed world affairs, the Middle East (again) and balancing politics with family life. Tory insiders later claimed that the senator had said to Cameron: “I want to congratulate you on all you’ve achieved.”

Onlookers chanted: “Oba-ma! Oba-ma! Oba-ma!” But in truth, the prophet underwhelmed. As he implied, he is neither genius nor idiot, just an everyday global saviour.

I'd like to ask Obama exactly what he thinks Cameron has achieved...is he referring to his admiration of the Cameron's PR skills??

Wood also provides more detail about the "time to think" exchange.

Cameron:“These guys just chalk your diary up.”
Obama:“Right. In 15-minute increments . . .”
Cameron:“We call it the dentist’s waiting room. You have to scrap that because you’ve got to have time.”
Obama:“And, well, and you start making mistakes, or you lose the big picture. Or you lose a sense of, I think you lose a feel . . .” Cameron:“Your feeling. And that is exactly what politics is all about. The judgment you bring to make decisions.”
Obama:“That’s exactly right. And the truth is that we’ve got a bunch of smart people, I think, who know 10 times more than we do about the specifics of the topics.
“And so if what you’re trying to do is micromanage and solve everything then you end up being a dilettante but you have to have enough knowledge to make good judgments about the choices that are presented to you.”

Yup, Obama is ready to rely on all those advisors he has because they know "10 times" more than he does. Well, considering that he knows zip, how much more can these advisors know?  Not encouraging.  He sounds EXACTLY like George Bush when he was running in 2000.

But what's missing from the accounts of the "new kids" confab is the the subject which Cameron brought up a couple of weeks ago, before the arrival of The Chosen One.

A little over a month ago I wrote about an interview in which Cameron praised Obama's Father's Day speech (Breaking: Tory Leader David Cameron "Hearts" Obama Talks About "Progressive Goals" Achieved by "Conservative Means)

Even more interesting is a comment Cameron made about how he views the modern Conservative Party in the UK.

Cameron "appeals to the centre and left 'to recognise that the modern Conservative party is on the brink of a very big and exciting argument that if you want to pursue progressive goals in Britain, whether it is greening the environment, tackling poverty, unlocking social mobility, there is a really good case to say that you can best achieve those by Conservative means.'"

MMMMM. Are Cameron and the Tories following Obama's lead, or is it the other way around?

I'm still wondering about that statement. And I still think it describes the way Obama thinks to a "T." He talks a good game, but in the end, many of his ideas sound like they could fit in with Republican approaches. We've seen his flip-flopping vote on FISA. Social Security is one area I wouldn't trust him on...all that money from Wall Street is coming in for a reason. And, how "progressive" was his bill on nuclear safety after he caved to the "conservatives"/GOP and re-wrote the bill to help out Exelon?

If there's one thing that should be kept in mind as this miserable election season progresses, it is Cameron- the-PR-man's clever phrase "progressive goals...best achieved... by conservative means."  It sound great as a slogan, but what would actually happen if Cameron--or Obama--wound up in charge?

My guess is that with Obama we'd get "watered down progressive goals" to achieve the satisfaction of "conservatives."  And that's reality, not PR...

Today's edition of The Sunday Times Magazine, which is part of The Sunday Times of London, has published a lengthy and very disurbing portrait of the London-based singer Amy Winehouse. The article, titled "Can Amy Winehouse be saved?" and written by Robert Sandall, has also appeared in Rolling Stone magazine.

The piece chronicles Winehouse descent into using what are considered Class A drugs in the UK. Like many others, writer Sandall places the start of Winehouse's downfall at the beginning of her relationship with Blake Fielder-Civil. Fielder-Civil, now Winehouse's husband, has admitted to introducing her to hard drugs (Winehouse had previously only smoked pot) and is now incarcerated on charges of GBH (grievous bodily harm) and attempting to pervert the course of justice in the beating of a bartender.

Raye Cosbert, Winehouse's current manager, believes that Winehouse's great discomfort with fame has played a part in her downfall. He told Sandall:

"Amy is a public person. She's not like your usual reclusive star. She likes ordinary people. She likes playing pool with the bin men in her local. If she could take the Tube everywhere, she would. She feels deeply uncomfortable in the world of VIP celebrity. It's unfortunate that you can't teach somebody how to deal with fame."

The article goes on to discuss Winehouse's puzzlement as to why a huge crowd had come to see her perform at a 2007 show in London and reveals her envy of the fact that Matt Helders, the drummer with the hugely successful UK band Arctic Monkeys, can walk around in public virtually unnoticed due to his place at the back of the stage.

Then again, Matt Helders doesn't live in a walk-up flat in London with easy access for the press, isn't covered in attention-gettnig tattoos, and isn't involved in a headline-grabbing romance with a felon. But I digress.

Winehouse's sad tale has never been told better than it has been in Sandall's article. It is a must-read. Anyone with an interest in a life in the public eye should read it for lessons in what not to do. The article is available online at http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article4383952.ece.

There is a related article on the BBC 6 Music Web site at http://www.bbc.co.uk/6music/news/20080727_AmyFame.shtml.

From time to time, I have the chance to work from home - which makes me giddy like a small child at Christmas for two reasons:

1. It's another 30 or 40 minutes wrapped in the cocoon of my duvet. Bliss.

2. I can make lunch at home and eat something that I wouldn't normally even think about bringing into the office.

Cherry and goat's cheese salad from The Sunday Times (Style section), Lucas Hollweg

Serves 4 but it's pretty easy to cut down to one

You'll need:

2 teaspoons sherry vinegar
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt and pepper
2 big handfuls of baby spinach
4 handfuls of cherries, pitted
200g soft white goat's cheese (the stuff that comes in plastic tubs, not the rinded logs)
2 handfuls of whole or flaked blanched almonds toasted in a dry frying pan until tinged gold

1. Whisk together the vinegar and oil, and season well.

2. Toss in a salad bowl with the leaves and cherries. Add the goat's cheese and gently fold in, then scatter with the almonds. Serve.

Cook's notes

Oops - I misread the recipe and used two tablespoons of sherry vinegar. Happily, this turned out to be a good thing as I hate oily dressing anyway.

I only had the oozy, gooey type of goat's cheese in the fridge and the recipe was none the worse for it.

Lucas also has a rather tempting-looking cherry frangipane tart in the same article. I think I've got enough cherries left over...

The Dynamics of the Relationship between Biographer and Subject.

Oscar Wilde said, "Every person has their disciples, but it is usually Judas who writes the biography." By its very nature biography demands that a relationship is forged between biographer and the subject - albeit one of varying depths and tensions.

The biographer comes to the subject with a pre-conceived notion as to why he wants to write about the subject, and in return, if the subject authorises the biography, he/she, too, is desirous of a certain outcome. However, is it possible for a completely unbiased result to emanate from this relationship, one that will satisfy both biographer and subject, and ultimately the readers who seek out the biographies? This essay seeks to explore the relationships between biographers and their subjects, the possibility of impartiality and the relevance for New Journalism.

            Biography is one of the most compelling and popular literary genres. Through biography, readers seek to understand human experience. They look to the personal experiences of the subject – hopes, struggles, emotions, social circumstances – to find significance in the subject’s life, and thereby significance or relevance in their own lives.

            When approached from a purely academic perspective, biographies may become nothing more than a log of facts. And yet, when borrowing from fictional techniques to render a subject with personality and character or to frame the subject in a setting, the biographer may be accused of fictionalising - an accusation which could discredit the biographer. It is the very essence of biography –  the biographer’s interpretation of the lives and facts about the subject– that will always carry the greatest risk.

     Reasons to write biographies about specific subjects are obviously diverse and vast, but according to biographer Backscheider, “cultural interests, economics, and ambition merge with the personal and may even be the primary motives for choosing a particular subject.” Biographers assume that what a person does “expresses an inner life – personality, motives, aspirations, character.”(Backscheider:2001)       

Perhaps the wisdom of English biographer George Painter would be prudent for writers to consider when examining one’s motives to write the life of another person. “The biographer must discover, beneath the mask of the artist’s everyday, objective live, the secret life from which he extracted his work.”(Hobbs:1999)

     The biographer’s voice and choice of material is enormously powerful in transmitting a tone that will encourage or discourage reader identification and/or empathy with the subject.

   “Personally, when I read about someone's life, I don't necessarily care about the subjective opinion the biographer has of his or her work, especially when I find it perversely wrongheaded. Nor do I care to be reminded that the biographer is running around interviewing everybody he can find, or rummaging through all the archives, through constructions like "so-and-so said to me." Unless, of course, the biographer can do these things in an interesting way. But not everybody can write The Quest for Corvo or Shelley: The Pursuit, and quite a few people should stop trying.”(www.beatrice.com)

     The voice of the biographer is one aspect of the biographical genre that allows the reader to accept or reject the biographer’s interpretation of the subject. In the genre of New Journalism, the voice of the writer is evident and it is therefore anticipated that any marriage between these two genres will result in the writer adopting a voice that seeks to engage the reader in the life and/or work of the subject.

     “Commenting on the regressive effect that both journalistic and psychoanalytic relationships have, Malcolm observes that 'the subject becomes a kind of child to the writer, regarding him as a permissive, all-accepting, all-forgiving mother, and expecting that the book will be written by her. Of course, the book is written by the strict, all-noticing, unforgiving father.’”(Boynton:2005)

     The relationship between biographer and subject has always been a site of difficulty, and journalist Janet Malcolm’s observation possibly captures the feelings of an aggrieved subject who feels that they have been betrayed by their biographer.

     One of the earliest literary biographies is Memoirs of the Author of the Rights of Woman which William Godwin wrote about his wife, writer Mary Wollstonecraft  in the late 18^th century. The intellectual couple had enjoyed a satisfying if somewhat unconventional marriage and Godwin’s biography was the first honest, transparent biography of a woman. When Memoirs was published, the Historical Magazine called it “‘the most hurtful book’ of 1798.  The poet Robert Southey accused Godwin of ‘a want of all feeling in stripping his dead wife naked’. The European Magazine described the work as ‘the history of a philosophical wanton’.”(Holmes:2000 )

     Godwin sought to write a book that would present a portrait of his wife in which all facets of her personality would be considered in her make-up as a writer. It was a complete biography “intimate in detail and often critical of Wollstonecraft’s behaviour, though always understanding and passionately committed to her genius” and finally “with tender simplicity he described their own liaison and marriage… and in almost gynaecological detail, her tragic death after bearing her second daughter, Mary.”(Holmes:2000 )

The Monthly Review wrote, “’blushes would suffuse the cheeks of most husbands if they were forced to relate those anecdotes of their wives which Mr Godwin voluntarily proclaims to the world. The extreme eccentricity of Mr Godwin’s sentiments will account for his conduct. Virtue and vice are weighed by him in a balance of his own. He neither looks to marriage with respect, nor to suicide with horror.”(Holmes:2000 )

     It was Godwin’s conviction “that a writer’s duty was to carry honest feeling from private to public life”, but the world wasn’t ready for this radical honesty and the biographer was considered to be nothing more than “an unfeeling husband who betrayed family secrets.”(Holmes:2000 )

     The Memoirs caused Godwin endless personal torment. The Anti-Jacobin and other magazines kept up a remorseless onslaught against Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft, including indexing the book under “’Prostitution: see Mary Wollstonecraft’”.   Women writers who had previously been sympathetic to Wollstonecraft’s ideologies felt that “the very form of biography betrayed the ideology of feminism. It made Mary Wollstonecraft seem too romantic and too dangerous a figure.”(Holmes:2000 ) They too rejected Godwin’s biography, and Wollstonecraft was excluded from at least two biographies of women writers that were written after her death.

     This unanimous outrage from all sectors came as a great shock to Godwin and he never again employed the bold honesty that was contrary to the conventions of the time in either his fiction or his philosophical writing.

      Candour and courage are two of the cornerstones of New Journalism, and are sought by readers of contemporary biographies or biographical fragments in newspapers and magazines.  Readers expect the biographer to ask the questions that the subject doesn’t possibly want to answer. And more than this, readers expect a biography to be recounted with integrity.

     W H Auden, Charles Dickens and Henry James burned their letters and private documents and Rudyard Kipling bequeathed all his letters to his daughter who refused to make them available for public perusal after his death.  Personal documents are just one of the tools available to the biographer to gain interiority into the life of a subject, especially of a subject who is no longer alive. In the case of a deceased subject it is the role of the biographer to access and assimilate secondary sources, such as letters, documents, diaries, interviews with family, friends, enemies, etc., which will lead the biographer to drawing a substantially researched composite of the subject’s life.

     Ronald Suresh Roberts was contracted by Random House to write Nadine Gordimer’s biography. For almost a decade Suresh Roberts was granted unlimited access to Gordimer’s private study and its contents.  In the controversial biography entitled No Cold Kitchen, an extract of which appeared in The Sunday Times, Suresh Roberts gives an interesting insight into how Nadine Gordimer views people’s perceptions of her, specifically journalists.       

“In a 1986 letter Gordimer thanked her outgoing French media minder for ‘supporting me with your friendship and understanding when I am thrown to the journalist wolves (and some even eat like wolves; do you remember the lunch with Francoise Xenakis when she was supposed to be interviewing me, but her mouth was so full all the time she really couldn’t . . . ) . I am touched to think that you not only put up with me, but also have warm feelings towards me.’”(Suresh Roberts:2004 )

     When Gordimer read a draft of the biography she withdrew her authorisation decrying Suresh Roberts’ interference in her private life. Asked by a journalist how much readers are entitled to know about the private life of writers, she said, “There’s no entitlement at all… All there really is to know of the writer is in the work. How the writer lived as an individual and as a human being is entirely his or her private affair.”(Baron:2004 )

     In a 1987  interview with a Norwegian Journalist Gordimer said, “My lovers are my private business.”(Schoonakker:2004 )

     Does a biographical subject have the luxury of ‘private business’?

     Nadine Gordimer dismissed writing her autobiography, yet she gave Suresh Roberts, as authorised biographer, unlimited access to her personal documents.  Surely her sentiment that how she lived her private life was of no consequence to anyone else, is a naïve response from such an accomplished writer who is well aware that a writer’s life-experiences informs their writing.

     Biography seeks to superimpose life over work and work over life in the hope of weaving patterns of meaning that have shaped the life of the subject. To expect that the biographer will judiciously weed out the caustic letters, intimate observations and personal declarations that attest to the ordinary-ness of the subject is a callow expectation.

     All journalists or biographers are faced with material about which they have to make a decision. It is accepted that the writer cannot include everything about the subject, but it is hoped that the writer will include a selection of facts that are truly representative of the subject and which selection produces a balanced view of the subject’s life and/or their work.

     The integrity of the biographer, in his assimilation and interpretation of these sources, will determine the final picture of the subject that the biographer reveals to the world. Christopher Ricks’ review of Norman Mailer’s The Executioner’s Song, describes the role of Mailer as biographer of executed murderer Gary Gilmore, “Mailer is … the medium, not the message.”(Ricks:2003)

     Mailer may have been able to maintain authorial integrity, but not all biographers can be held in the same high esteem. In a parallel situation, writer Joe McGinnis was afforded exclusive access to murder accused and finally convicted murderer, Jeffrey MacDonald. During the trial and subsequent to the conviction, MacDonald continued to grant McGinnis access to his home and personal records. It was during this complete access to information that McGinnis found a document in which MacDonald admitted to taking diet pills and although he stated in the document that he wasn’t sure if he had taken diet pills on the day of the murder, McGinnis deliberately omitted MacDonald’s uncertainty.  One of the side-effects of the diet pills was psychosis, which supported McGinnis’ personal verdict of MacDonald’s guilt. This manipulation of facts directly attests to McGinnis’ lack of integrity.

     Long before the end of the trial, McGinnis had concluded that MacDonald was guilty and yet in almost two years worth of correspondence to MacDonald subsequent to the verdict, McGinnis commiserated with the murderer about his conviction, giving no hint that it was his intention to portray MacDonald as a killer in the book he was writing.

     McGinnis may have shirked his biographical conscience, but he was sued by MacDonald and in the subsequent trial he put out a missive to several journalists to follow his own trial. It promised to be a worthy case. How valid was it to put a journalist on trial for telling the truth as he perceived it?

     Janet Malcolm was the only journalist who took McGinnis’ bait. Her relationship with McGinnis resulted in the book The Journalist and the Murderer which she subsequently wrote in 1998, accusing McGinnis of duplicity in order to get the story.

She also slated journalists en-masse in what has become a notorious definition, "every journalist who is not too stupid or too full of himself knows that what he does is morally indefensible.”(Malcolm:1998 ) However, Malcolm’s own agenda and reputation are not nearly as lily-white as she would have McGinnis or readers believe.

     The New Yorker Magazine is Malcolm’s stomping ground. It was on their literary pages that In the Freud Archives, her magnum opus in character assassination, was first published in 1983 – a two-part vilification of psychoanalyst Jeffrey Masson.

     Masson was outraged at Malcolm’s “portrayal of him as a stupendously promiscuous braggart and narcissist, Masson promptly called his lawyer. ‘I was completely devastated,’ he later testified in court. ‘I had never been so upset in my whole life.’ In November 1984, Masson sued Malcolm, The New Yorker, and Knopf (which published the articles in book form) for libel, claiming that virtually everything Malcolm had quoted him as saying (such as ‘I was like an intellectual gigolo’) was either false, distorted, or had been taken out of context.”(Boynton:2005 )

     The court case dragged on for twelve years through five complaints, one dismissal, two appeals, a hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court, a hung jury, and finally a completed trial that eventually decided in Malcolm’s favour.

     Suresh Roberts was outraged at Gordimer’s withdrawal of her authorisation. "This is outrageous behaviour by a woman who claims to be a champion of free speech," Suresh Roberts said, “she wanted to appear without vanity or blemish. I resisted and she emerges in rounded, human terms. It's just that she is unaccustomed to being written about in ways over which she has no control."(Suresh Roberts:2004)

In the Gordimer / Suresh Roberts case, local opinion went against Suresh Roberts and supporters of Gordimer rejected Suresh Roberts for introducing “into what was intended to be serious literary work, bits of unworthy gossip."(Schoonakker:2004 )

     Fellow journalists and writers accused Malcolm of using the McGinnis case to purge her writerly soul of her crime against Masson and against journalism itself. They suggested that the book was nothing more than “a veiled biography” (Boynton:2005 ). Malcolm defended herself by saying that the two suits were completely different, but many felt that the fundamental aspect to both was the betrayal of a friend.

     Time magazine warned readers  that “Malcolm has a tendency to hog the stage; her sense of identification with Plath as another literary young lady of the 1950s is so often trumpeted that readers not interested in purchasing an autobiography of Janet Malcolm should consider themselves forewarned.”(Sacks:1994 )

     Gordimer's US publishers, Farrar, Straus & Giroux backed their writer and stated that the reason that Gordimer’s authorisation had been withdrawn was “mainly to do with the meandering quality of the narrative and the author's gratuitous insertion of himself into it."(Schoonakker:2004 )

     The biographer invites the reader to participate in areas of common interest and he clearly reminds the reader of the position he retains in the biography with the use of the authorial “I”.

     South African writer Jann Turner says “someone said that all writers have ‘a sliver of ice’ in our hearts. I think that when I'm looking at something that I want to turn into a story I'm already standing at a certain distance from it. On the other hand you have stand close enough to be able to know and understand your subject. Finding the right distance or proximity is part of the creative tension.” There is no doubt that relationships between biographers and their subjects are fraught with tensions that are inherent in biographical intimacy.

      In nearly all of Ms Malcolm’s biographical pieces, she has been accused of betrayal by the subjects. In her first book, Diana and Nikon: Essays on the Aesthetic of Photography Malcolm, referring to the photographer, states, "Avedon does not try to make people look bad…he simply doesn't do anything to make them look good”(Selligman:2005 ). Is this a philosophy that she took to heart?

     In Psychoanalysis: The Impossible Profession she refers to her subject as a "remarkable and lovable man" in her acknowledgements, but then paints him as an “ambitious, narcissistic, gossipy and even venal man.”(Selligman:2005 )

     In The Journalist and the Murderer, Malcolm readily admits that the subject “has to face the fact that the journalist -- who seemed so friendly and sympathetic, so keen to understand him fully, so remarkably attuned to his vision of things -- never had the slightest intention of collaborating with him on his story but always intended to write a story of his own.”(Malcolm:1998 )

     Fred Friendly, an American broadcaster protested that Malcolm’s sweeping accusation against all journalists was "distorted by a crabbed vision of the profession and her own place in it."(Selligman:2005 )

     One of the tenets of new journalism is that the writer places themselves at the centre of the story. Malcolm, Suresh Roberts and Godwin all placed themselves in the story and yet all are accused of betrayal.

     Gay Talese followed Frank Sinatra for an evening and forty years later, his four-part biography is still celebrated as a remarkable piece of integrity-filled writing.

      “I think [the journalists] short-change their readers and themselves if they treat the folks they cover with detachment that borders on disdain and also fail to use their special knowledge and experience to its best advantage,” observes journalist Bill O'Connell writing in  FineLine: The Newsletter On Journalism Ethics.

     It is apparent that the relationship between biographer and subject is always going to be the contested site of two agendas and perhaps Caroline Drinker Bowen has the best solution, “In writing biography, fact and fiction shouldn’t be mixed. And if they are, the fiction parts should be printed in red ink, the fact parts in black ink.”(Hobbs:1999 )

This letter was printed in the 29 June edition of The Sunday Times:

Level pit and cover all previous imprints ( The Sunday Times, 29 June 2008 )

I refer to Eric Song's article in The Sunday Times of June 22, headlined 'Calvin's 7.45m is new long jump mark'.  

The feat was achieved under a cloud of controversy, with officials accused of measuring the wrong distance following the two imprints in the sand after Calvin Cheng's jump.  

What happened on that day must not happen again, if we want to lend credibility to any national records broken.  

In the first place, it was not fair to the athlete breaking the national record as it would cast a shadow of doubt. It would also not be fair to the previous national record-holder if the assessment of the new mark was not in line with international standards.   

Imagine a soccer match in which the coach or team manager and other observers were able to go on to the field and have a dialogue with the referee and linesman on whether the goal should be allowed.

Back to athletics. This controversial long jump result would not have happened, if the pit was properly levelled to cover all previous imprints before each jump and the two officials were attentive to the proceedings.  

If the officials who were next to the pit could not be 100 per cent sure of the jump imprint, how could others who were much further away? We need to upgrade the skills of our officials, so as not to take away the glory from an athlete.  

Goh Hock Siang  

My thoughts:

I posted this letter because I thought it was really well-written and well-argued.

Most importantly, it asks the most important question that had remained unasked in the media reports of promising young jumper Calvin Cheng's national record-breaking feat during the Boys U-20 long jump at the recently-concluded 34th Singapore Junior Athletics Championships:

Why wasn't the pit properly levelled by the judges before Calvin's record-breaking jump of 7.45m, which erased Kenneth Wang Kan's previous record of 7.41m?   

Clearly, it hadn't been, and clearly the two judges at the pit weren't attentive enough during the jump. Otherwise, there wouldn't have been two imprints in the pit after Calvin's jump, causing confusion among the judges (who had ruled the distance as 6.94m before doing a re-measurement upon Calvin's coach's protest and eventually declaring the final distance as 7.45m).

"We need to upgrade the skills of our officials so as not to take away the glory from an athlete", said Mr Goh.

Hear, hear.

Mr Goh is spot on. Because of all the confusion surrounding the judges' decisions, two athletes have been emotionally affected by the whole saga.

Kenneth is naturally upset because his national record has been taken away from him under such dubious circumstances, while Calvin must now put up with unneccessary doubts from some quarters about the authenticity of his record-breaking distance, until he gets another competitive opportunity to prove his critics wrong.

Sure, Singapore Athletics Association vice-president Loh Lin Yeow has come out publicly to defend his judges' final decision - that the 7.45m distance is correct, and a new national record.

But that doesn't alter the fact that ALL THIS COULD HAVE BEEN AVOIDED IN THE FIRST PLACE. And unfortunately, because it wasn't, I feel that the SAA is all to blame for all this.

I mean, it is really pathetic to think that certain standards of judging and officiating could not be maintained at the Singapore Junior Athletics Championships, which is one of the few annual national-level events featuring the cream of the local junior athletics scene.  

It will be interesting to see if there is a reply from the SAA to Mr Goh's letter in this weekend's issue of The Sunday Times.

I really hope there is. Otherwise, the silence from the national body would be very damning.

Yours in sport

Singapore Sports Fan

(Note: Picture of jumper taken from images.beijing-2008.org. Picture of "Judging the Judges" book cover from www.jeffooi.com)

Related links:

24 June - Fields of gold: 14 new national open and junior records and counting!

21 June - Newsflash: Calvin Cheng smashes national long jump mark at S'pore Juniors 

This imprompto soundtrack is spot on. The music, the lyrics, the cadence of the artists voice, the rhythm of the guitars, the snap of the snare, all of it puts you in the moment and you're lost; to the music.

And that's just the first track.

On his sophomore album, David Ford takes his diary, empties it out, and tries to convey to the listener the turmoil of his new-found self-awareness and wanting for things that may have been, up until now, unattainable. He swimmingly croons through a sea of relationship-laden tracks as if David Gray was sitting on a lifeguard tower ready to jump in and save him with some of his own British electro-pop styled mouth-to-mouth. Mr. Gray better put on some more SPF30, because he's gonna be there a while.

We here at eargoggles have just secured a copy of his latest album Songs For the Road out on Original Signal Recordings earlier this April, digitally in February. Great to listen to in the car; probably the reason for the title. Upon first listen it is quite impressive; hit well with the current weather change in Southern California (a little relief from the low-100s with a balmy mid-70s day). It has, as mentioned before--and we hate to equate artists to other artists, a David Gray feel, with maybe some of Bright Eyes frontman Conor Oberst in here--Mason Jennings, perhaps--wait! no!! Jason Anderson. You know, good sweater music--good for a brisk walk or an Autumn read on the porch sippin' on some coffee or tea--with some Bailey's or whiskey.

The album was released last fall in the UK where it received rave reviews from The Sunday Times (Best of 2007: "...a devastating reminder that an artist witha keening voice, an ear for melody and a willingness, lyrically, to wrestle withdemons can still take the breathaway."), The Guardian ("…[Ford] has a real and thrilling edge."), and The Sun ("This is a sublime 37 minutes of music. It’s melodic songwriting on par with Damien Rice, folk singing reminiscent of The Pogues and lyric writing as good as Bright Eyes."). Wow! So we were spot on with the Bright Eyes compairison.

He's got all the tools for a succesful commercial jump to America. He's got the voice, the gimicky sound, and a signature look; he wears a fedora/bowler-like hat (see above and in the videos).

That was at first listen.

Now, when you watch him it's a totalydifferent story. Looping live noises, strums of a guitar, drum beats, as well as harmonizing with multi-tracked recordings looped of himself on top of live vocals performed live is where it gets very interesting. While we here at eargoggles are huge fans of Andrew Bird, who also uses live instumentation and live recorded loops behind his very distinct voice, David Ford seems to have thrown at least 3/4 of the staff here for a loop. Watch some video below:

"Go to Hell!"

and here with "State of the Union"

Now see, that's pretty amazing! a nice change of pace, a little Nevertheless, David Ford will be playing in Los Angeles at the Hotel Cafe on July 10th. Definitely something to check-out if your in the area. We'll be there, well some of us, looking for a good time and some cool looking hats.

Live show review to come!

It is, in it's simplest form, just another site to watch web videos, except TidalTV has licensed some actual live streams of cable TV including stuff from FoodNetwork, AP and others.  It is a pretty neat layout with a program guide that allows you to channel surf a bit like real TV - something I think has been missing from the web video experience.

While the content is really limited right now and I don't think TidalTV is something one should invest money in since it seems remarkably easy to duplicate but it's worth taking a peek to absorb the interface.

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So, let me tell you all about it.  Because that way I have to sit down instead of bounding round the room like a hyperactive kangaroo.  I hope you're sitting comfortably because you know I'm never going to go straight down the narrative path.  As ever we will be following the twists and turns of my remarkably long winded brain.

When I was at university I used to be friends with a guy called Andy Lewis.  He was in his final year while I was in my first year.  He was a mod.  He was the moddest of mods.  He wasn't one of those scruffy clothes wearing mods.  He was one of those sharp suited man about town mods with pin sharp creases in his trousers and shoes you could skewer a winkle on.  He used to DJ at our uni discos.  This may sound a bit lame, but we were at Lampeter Uni.  It had less than a thousand students.  About a thousand residents in the town, eleven pubs and that was about it.  There was no nightlife unless, as in Victorian times, we made it ourselves.  Consequently the Student Union hall was 'the' place to see and be seen, and discos were a big event. 

Andy would dj and when he wasn't dj'ing he would dance very impressively (he was extremely good at twirling as I seem to recall).  Everyone knew him because a) he was the only Mod on campus, b) he ran the student mag and c) he was a very memorable dancer.  I believe he may have had something to do with a pirate radio station called Radio Daffodil as well.  I can't be sure about that because naturally it was all swathed in secrecy, apart from the bits where you could hear everyone else in the room (it was done from people's bedrooms, flats etc) having a chat, putting the kettle on and saying things like: 'Clyde, do you want a hob nob?'

I believe he was also involved in various of our extremely bizarre campus bands as well.  The ones which spring to mind were Dim Disgo Heno (which is Welsh for 'no disco tonight'.  All our posters had to be bilingual, so everyone knew a lot of what we called 'poster Welsh'.  This was one of those phrases in the 'Poster Welsh' guidebook), The Blend Band (who were huge amongst us thousand! And had a very fantastic song called Hey Verruca!),  The Rockin' Thunda's, who were large and scary and looked like portly versions of Rik Mayall in The Young Ones and once did a gig for 'The Merthyr Tydfill Earthquake Disaster Fund,' and Edmund Estefan and The Mydroilin Sound Machine.  These were probably the oddest of the bunch, consisting of a man called Edmund Simons who dressed as a bishop and a man called Robert Mighall who was known as The Scourge of All Christendom and who wore green and gold dresses with devil horns.  They had some interesting songs including: 'lemon in a bucket', and 'hooked on hymns' which was a kind of rave medley which I believe included Kum By Yah as you've never heard it before.  I believe that Robert is now some mover and shaker in the world of high level marketing, which amuses me greatly.  Edmund, I'm not sure about, but I suspect he's now somewhere terrorising people in much the same lines as the Professors on History Today. (You know that blob of spit? Yes, I am aware of that item. Well, That's your best swimming pool that is.  As I was saying about the peasant revolt of 1415...)

I used to write for the magazine, and help collate it (we had a photo copier and a lot of staplers.  It was heady stuff.  Apparently that's how they still put together The Sunday Times) and also deliver it.  At the end of the year when he handed over the reins of power to someone else he very kindly thanked me by name for being a good and helpful girl, and I nearly wept.  It was very exciting, me being a lowly first year, albeit and unknown to many other people, also in the deadly Banana Bunch, and a member of the Jelly Baby Terrorist squad.  These were other things we used to do to keep ourselves busy when times were hard.  The banana bunch was basically me and five friends who used to write threatening messages on pieces of soft fruit and leave them outside people's doors.  We also doctored the film soc poster for 'A Clockwork Orange', which was quite a coup.  The jelly baby thing was us torturing poor defenceless jelly babies in a variety of evil ways and then leaving their corpses outside people's doors.  My particular favourite was the staged hanging with the elastic band and a drawing pin.  Mostly we did weird stuff and left it lying around for other people to find.

Anyway, then Andy graduated and went off to become famous, popping back to Lampeter every now and again to remind himself why he had left, presumably.  We didn't keep in touch and I had no idea what he was doing.  Then quite recently I was listening to a favourite CD of mine, which is a collection of random Sixties lounge music from a DJ night that used to be big in London called Blow Up.  This cd, Blow up A Go Go has been in my collection for years.  I love it dearly and so do the kids.  So we were dancing away to Bert's Apple Crumble, which is a very cool song, and when it finished I had to have a sit down, because I am old.  The kids kept on jiving and I read the sleeve notes.  This is the first time I've read the sleeve notes ever, because I am just not one of those High Fidelity type Nick Hornbyesque listy people when it comes to music.  I was reading away and suddenly read the name Andy Lewis.  Then I thought: 'Hmmmm! This is the kind of music 'my' (if you will forgive the ownership) Andy Lewis liked.  I wonder if it be he?' 

It was, dear reader, a lightbulb moment.  Anyway, it was he and I annoyed him on Facebook and he annoyed me back and we resumed our friendship and all was lovely.  He is very famous.  He hangs out with Paul Weller and Blur as was, and makes records and goes to London Fashion Week.  He's still a mod and he's still groovy.  I expect he still dances around very well, although I have no proof, and I expect like me that every now and again he has to have a little sit down, unlike the days of yesteryear.  I am not very famous, except for being a bit eccentric in Glenfield.  He is very nice, so this doesn't seem to matter too much at all.  Hooray for us.

Anyway (bear with me.  We're nearly there now).  Last week when my friend Paul came round to have tea and cakes he mentioned to me that he is going to see Paul Weller in concert on Monday and he is very, very excited because Paul Weller is his absolute god and idol and has been super shiny for Paul since he was but a wee tadpole.  I said: 'Ohhh! My friend Andy knows him and sometimes plays in his band.'  Paul looked at me in that way kids look at you at school when you say stuff like: 'Yeah! And, so, like. Well, because my dad is bigger than yours and he has a better car!' as if to say: 'Yeah! Right!' and then he said something along the lines of how cool it would be to be acknowledged by Mr. Weller in his role as Musical God of the Western Universe, clearly thinking that this was never, ever going to happen because I was just showing off to my friend to make myself seem cool and important so that he wouldn't beat me up and steal all my toys.

So, I e-mailed Andy and asked him if he could possibly get Paul Weller to say: 'Hello Mum!' to my Paul, because he would probably wee his pants with excitement and all would be well, and all manner of things would be well.  I also said that I would understand if he thought I was being a cheeky monkey, bein' as how we haven't seen each other since about 1994, and the best that I can offer in return is not to tell him how hard it is to stop small boys sliding over their potential wedding tackle and getting slide burn, which might ruin the idea of ever being wedded in the first place.  It's not even a case of 'fair exchange is no robbery' really is it?

Anyway, Andy is an absolute star and lovely person because not only has he offered for Paul and his wife Jackie to go back stage and meet Mr. Weller after the gig, but I am allowed to go too, and I didn't even have a front stage pass!  When I rang Paul he was so excited I thought he was going to burst my ear drum off, leaving only a shattered stump.  Apparently Jackie had to be escorted to the sofa for a lie down and they have now been worrying about what to wear since yesterday afternoon.  Paul is already planning on buying a new t-shirt it's that serious!  My experience of gigs is that they have always been hot, sweaty and the less you wear whilst still clinging to your dignity, the better.

Anyway, Paul and Jackie are currently carving me a throne and will be carrying me through the streets of Melton Mowbray, throwing cake and jewels at me and singing hymns in my praise. It seems a bit unfair given that it was Andy who did all the work, but I have mailed him and offered him the use of the throne, although I will probably eat the cake myself.  I was talking to my cousin Tom about all this.  He said that I am truly Jim'll. I said I wasn't really, for the abovementioned reason.  He pointed out that Jim'll didn't do any of the actual work either.  He just lounged about in his big red chair, dispensing largesse when other people actually did all the work, so I am really really like Jim'll.  I have to concur.  It feels quite good.  I must make oversized badges on strings for Paul, Mr. Weller and Jackie and probably Andy as well.  I'll get the kids to do it at the weekend.  Thank god I put tin foil in the Ocado order.

Now I am worrying.  Paul (my Paul, not Mr. Weller) is also worrying because he doesn't know what he's going to say to Mr. Weller.  I too have no idea.  I'm rather hoping that I will merely get to say: 'Hello Mr. Weller (tugging forelock and looking 'umble), great gig, before scurrying on back to see Andy and talk about random shite like washing your John Smedley jumpers in spring water and whether he's thinking of doing a cover of 'Hooked on Hymns' on his next album.  Andy is used to me talking shite.  I'm famous for it in my own little world.  Paul Weller isn't used to me talking shite, and when I get nervous I talk even more shite than normal.  I will probably blurt out something about velour snails or regale him with the vendetta of the Doo Bobs and the lost frisbee of doom, and the poor man will shrivel up, screaming for help as I am escorted from the premises by two burly minders, both called Dave.

A friend of mine once had the great honour to sit in the box of fame at a Red Hot Chilli Peppers gig.  He was very excited about this.  He was even more excited when it turned out that he was sitting next to Jimmy Page from Led Zeppelin, who was his all time Rock God Hero Extraordinaire.  He was telling me all about this with great enthusiasm and much waving of hands (presumably to indicate how tall and wide Mr. Page was.  I always think he would be quite short and a bit stumpy, although he's clearly got very long arms and tenacious finger control).  So I said to him: 'Great Jon.  And what did you say to Jimmy?' At which point he looked very shame faced and quite a bit shuffly and said something in a muffled voice which I couldn't quite hear properly.  I asked him to say it again and he looked at me and said quietly: 'I said, 'Hello Jimmy!'  at which point I went quiet myself and said: 'Oh! Was that it?' and he said, even more quietly: 'Yes!' and confessed that it had all gotten too much for him and he was so overwhelmed he simply didn't know what to say, so he didn't say anything at all.  We vowed never to speak of it again.  You see, it pays to be prepared in these circumstances.

I don't know anything much about music.  I know what I like, but half the time I can't remember what it's called, so I can't even say: 'Wow, I thought that bit where you played the spoons was tremendous' in case it was in fact a harpsichord, or it was the worst bit of the show or something.  It's all a bit Rabbit in the Headlights.  In fact the only thing I can really think that I would want to talk to Paul Weller about seriously is the fact that he went through a stage of wearing John Craven type jumpers for a while, and I was worried.  I was worried about whether he had in fact pinched them off of John, where I could picture John naked and shivering in a little ditch, soldiering on bravely with Countryfile while Weller scarpered with his knitwear. 

I can understand why one would want to go for comfy knitwear after years of being renowned as being one of the sharpest dressed men in the world of pop, but still, it's a bit of a shock really.  I would imagine doing a couple of hours gig under blazing spotlights in a heavy knit jumper with reindeer frolicking on the front would get a bit sweaty as well.  Perhaps that's how he manages to remain so lithe and trim.  No Slimming World for him.  None of these aquanautic silver suits where you leap about in them for hours and sweat all your fat off.  Nope, it's three choruses of 'Changing Man', two encores of 'Going Underground' and some frenzied guitar playing in the hot lights with a thirty toggle jumper on and bob is your very slim uncle.

So, questions for Paul Weller on a postcard please.  Something to make me sound intelligent, but not too pushy and not like the totally abstract ditzhead that I really am.

My Paul sent me an e-mail to say thank you.  It's very sweet and he's worked all the titles of Paul Weller songs into it.  It must have taken him bloody ages.  It's never likely to get published in an anthology, so he has given me permission to publish it here so that you can be privy to the sweat of his brow (he probably wrote it wearing a jumper) and his very real obsession with the man himself:

What can I say – you’re an “English Rose”. Whenever you find yourself in as “Strange Town” or a “Wild Wood” look for the man in a “Peacock Suit” for he will guide you out and back to “Suzie’s Room”. You will find this on “Friday Street” near the church with the “Porcelain Gods” outside. Remember now that you are “In the City” “In the Crowd”, but don’t be “Frightened” as “Time Passes” you will be at the “Foot of the Mountain” or somewhere in the “Country”.