Two ‘New Media’ events in Edinburgh in the next seven days:
First, I’m going to try and get along to an event this Saturday 18th called Cathay House Blend, curated by ‘Intercultural Artist’ Kimho Ip. He’ll be collaborating with Scotland’s electro-pop chancers FOUND, who’ve just returned from gigging in London at the BBC Electric Proms. It is at the National Museums of Scotland.
Second, New Media Scotland are invoking the Scottish Enlightenment, and giving away free glasses of anCnoc whisky at the Poker Club, next Thursday 23rd November at the Beehive Inn on the Grassmarket.
Meanwhile, Devil’s Kitchen hints that he may be starring in some kind of epic drinking theatrical extravaganza, This Lime Tree Bower, in late November. He hasnae publicised the date and location details yet.
Author: Robert (Page 281 of 328)
I’ve been reading a lot of Andrew Sullivan’s blog recently. He’s been plugging his new book, The Conservative Soul, and writing a great deal about how doubt is the essence of conservativism, as he sees it. By contrast, he says, much of right-wing politics in the USA has an Evangelical hue, and the certainty of the Christianist zealots is not actually very conservative at all.
This take has attracted many critics, including Jonah Goldberg at the National Review (which I came upon via Reason Magazine):
The fact that evil is rarely defeated by people who are unsure they are right is lost on Sullivan.
I disagree. Just because you are unsure whether you are right, it does not mean you cannot be sure that other people are wrong! You only really need confidence in the latter premise, to make a stand against evil.
Michael Leeden at The Corner, one of the National Review Online blogs:
You can be quite sure that the terror masters saw the election as a great victory, and Rumsfeld’s ritual sacrifice as a moment of glory. It will encourage them to redouble their efforts, both in Iraq/Afghanistan, and elsewhere. They believe they have Bush’s number, that they have broken him, and all they must do now is keep the blood flowing to accelerate our retreat.
This rhetoric from the terrorist perspective really annoys me. Why should we care about the terrorists’ opinion of us? Why do we let them get under our skin in this way?
The US mid-term elections were apparently free and fair. Division of power. Checks and balances on the executive. A 219 year-old constitution working exactly as it should. Democracy, working.
The terrorists might think that that they are winning. But by demonstrating a robust democratic system, we know that actually, it is we (or rather, our American friends) who have the upper hand. Doing something that is right, despite what opinion others may have of us, is the true sign of integrity and strength.
The obverse is also true. Doing something that is wrong, merely to save face, is a sign of weakness. This is why George W Bush is essentially a poor leader, lacking integrity, as we saw this week with volte-face regarding Donald Rumsfeld. An infringement of our civil liberties, or human rights, in the name of the War on Terror may well worry a few of those who are planning to do us harm. As we torture and detain, the terrorists may indeed think “Ooh dear, they have struck a blow against us.” But once again, those terrorists would be wrong. Just because these fanatics do not percieve the value of civil liberties, that does not mean such concepts have no place in our own thinking.
I was on the Isle of Colonsay last weekend. The dunes were unspoilt and beautiful. This picture shows a south-west view over to Oronsay in the foreground. That’s a ‘pap’ of Jura in the background, on the left.
The sky was clear on Bonfire Night, so we had a good opportunity to look through a telescope at another “magnificent desolation“, the Sea of Tranquility.
How odd, then, to hear that four days later, the peace of the islanders has been disturbed. There has been a crime on Colonsay! Apparently someone stole a couple of cars and went for a joyride.
I heard the news on the radio late last night, but can find no mention of it online this morning. I do not imagine that the perpetrators have escaped… so perhaps there’s been a cover-up on Colonsay too. Some friends of mine return from the Island today, so I will glean some more information from them over the weekend (unless, of course, they have been detained at Oban Police Station).
Update: I think I may have misheard. Armin Crewe’s Islay Blog has found some more details about housebreaking on the Island. The car thefts were a few years ago.
Meanwhile, my friends are stranded on the island. Poor weather meant their ferry never managed to leave Oban.
The men who killed Kriss Donald have been sentenced to long prison terms. Kriss was murdered by a gang of Muslim men, in Pollokshields (my old, brief, haunt) in 2004.
In the past, the authorities have been criticised for branding a murder ‘racially motivated’ only when the violence is perpetrated by whites on racial minorities, but not vice-versa. This tendency, say the critics, is a symptom of the Politically Correct malaise that has swept through the country.
It is worth noting that the police had no qualms in making the ‘racially motivated’ categorization in the case of these three thugs.
