I must have been in the dunny when they called

A headline from the (London) Daily Telegraph:

Bringing back knighthoods will create more republicans, Australians say ahead of Prince George visit

"Australians say"? Which Australians? Nobody asked me.

But read the first three paragraphs:

When Tony Abbott, the Australian prime minister, decided to reintroduce knighthoods and damehoods after a hiatus of 28 years, the country’s republicans should surely have been up in arms.
The tradition of honours being bestowed by the Queen had, after all, been abolished in 1986 after Australians rejected it as an antiquated link to the Mother Country.
But the Australian Republican Movement has welcomed the move, believing it will be so unpopular that it will turn ever greater numbers of people against the monarchy.

So it is the opinion of the ARM – the organisation that completely failed to achieve its aims back in 1999 and has completely failed since then ever to get any traction – it is their opinion that the restoration of Knighthoods will drive Australians into the arms of republicans. It is not actually the opinion of Australians as such, just the opinion of those opposed to the monarchy, that is: those who have failed so dismally in achieving their aims.

It is unfair to blame reporters for headlines. It is unusual for any heading they pick to be used on publication. But the author of this article is Gordon Rayner "Chief Reporter" who has form in writing stupid articles.

At least it was the right kind of Blair

The journalist Tim Blair used to work for one of Australia's oldest magazines, The Bulletin. It was founded in 1888 pushing republicanism against (British) Imperialism and "Australia for the White Man" (one of its straplines). In 2004 the Bulletin sent journalists to cover the trial of Schapelle Corby in Indonesia.

The Corby family were remarkably friendly and helpful to our people, giving the Bulletin more time and greater access than they gave reporters from most other outlets. As a result, despite the swarm of journalists in Bali – some waving cash – our weekly was able to grab a couple of fine exclusives.

Do read on to find out why.

The political catwalk

Ed Milband, the leader of the British Labour Party, recently got into a tizzy (rather in the manner of a certain on-again, off-again Australian Prime Minister on the subject of misogyny) because the Daily Mail pointed out his father was a Marxist. (By the way, has anyone else noticed the resemblance between Miliband fils and the Cbeebies star Mister Maker?)

Further or Alternatively reveals a further development. Not only was Ralph Miliband a Communist, but he was also a cat killer. In Australia we like to recruit the slayers of moggies for high political office themselves, not just their sons. Malcolm Turnbull sued and won when that story was first published. Ed Miliband seems to take it in better part:

I swear allegiance to the R. G. Casey Building in Barton

When I was visiting family in Peking a few years ago we went to Mass at the Wangfujing Church dedicated to St Joseph. I naturally assumed that this was run by the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association. This was the English Mass but it was a little surprising that an American priest was saying it. I knew that members of the CPCA are in an invidious position and that the situation is not as simple as a simple split between the outlawed Catholic Church and the schismatic CPCA. It is more like the distinction which existed between the Church of England and the Catholic Church at the the beginning of Elizabeth I's reign (right at the beginning there were still Catholic Bishops, but she removed them pretty quickly) than that at the end. Nevertheless it is one thing for a native Chinese to schismatize in an attempt to get along under the crushing tyranny of the People's Republic of China, quite another for a foreigner to do so. After all this priest was free to leave.

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The Trojan PM

Troy Bramston, who used to be the speech writer for Australia's answer to Grover Cleveland, Kevin Rudd, is impressed by the Presidential Library of George Bush II (oh, alright, President George W. Bush) and thinks we should have similar things here.

I for one would be very interested to go to the Vice Regal Library of Michael Jeffery. 

Maybe Kevin Rudd should call his three immediate predecessors Julia Gillard, John Howard and Paul Keating and ask them to partner with a university and offer them a start-up grant and ongoing funding to serve as an important educational tool and stimulate civic interest in government, politics and history.

I see. He means President as Head of Government (our PM) instead of President as Head of State (our G-G). First you have to ask, what's wrong with Hawke, Fraser and Whitlam? I mean, I know the answer, but why not include them? We already give these people generous pensions, offices and free travel. This is starting to look like money for menaces. "Cough up or I'll come back and pass another carbon tax, borrow money from a dodgy Iraqi businessman etc."

As a matter of fact U. S. Presidential libraries appear to be a waste of money and highly partisan. (See also: State of the Union  speeches, take that! The West Wing).

 

BBC Bias: So that's alright then

The BBC Trust recently published a review [pdf] on its practice of impartiality.

The BBC justifies its lack of impartiality about Christianity with the excuse ‘its not a perfect world’

Well there you have it, the BBC have invented a special class of impartiality for its journalists covering Christianity, ‘Due Impartiality’, which in this imperfect world means not bothering to be impartial. This bare-faced admission is in line with the prejudice and discrimination exhibited by UK courts who uphold ‘Due Religious Freedom’  for Christians, meaning ‘increasingly restricted religious freedoms’ for Christian Bed and Breakfast owners, Registrars, Counsellors, and Teachers.  Its also in line with the NHS’s version of ‘Due Freedom of Conscience’, which means no freedom of conscience for Midwives and Mental Health counsellors.

 

He'll do

The BBC has a bit of a problem with bias. Do you remember the Guardian's Operation Clark County?

In the run up to the US presidential election, the left-wing paper identified the area as a vote-swingers hotspot. Under Operation Clark County, it began a letter-writing campaign which aimed to give people outside the US a say in the election. The project set up its readers as pen pals with American voters, to press home the international ramifications of a vote for Republican George Bush or Democrat John Kerry.

It did not quite have the intended result.

In 2000, Al Gore won Clark County by 324 votes. And since Ralph Nader received 1,347 votes, we can assume Gore's margin would have been larger without Nader on the ballot. On Tuesday George Bush won Clark County by 1,620 votes. The most significant stat here is how Clark County compares to the other 15 Ohio counties won by Gore in 2000. Kerry won every Gore county in Ohio except Clark. He even increased Gore's winning margin in 12 of the 16. Nowhere among the Gore counties did more votes move from the blue [Democrat] to the red [Republican] column than in Clark. 

Anyway the genius responsible for Operation Clark County is now an editor on the BBC's Newsnight.

A few years ago this would have been about text messages (or: Another Reason to steer clear of Facebook)

Oh yes please. I would like the "comedians" on the misnamed Footy Show* to remove a photograph of my child from the internet to make fun of it by comparing it to some cabbage eared loon. Sign me up to Facebook AT ONCE!

Yes I know it's David Knox – who has never expressed a non-standard opinion on anything – but any stick will do with which to beat the Farcebook. If you prefer, here is The Australian.

*Given the Australian predilection for Rugby League and AFL (q.v.) it should be The Handy Show.

Reigniting the momentum in my collection of mixed metaphors

In 1923 A. E. Housman published a review of F. A. Simpson's Louis Napoleon and the Recovery of France 1848-1856. In the course of the review (be it noted – of a book written by one of his colleagues at Trinity College, Cambridge) he criticises "the slang with which Mr Simpson now and then defiles his pen". Housman might regard the following as (to defile my keyboard with slang) shooting fish in a barrel.

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On the usefulness of Latin

I am shocked at what I am about to do: post a link to something from an Australian newspaper – from the Sydney Boring Herald no less – and not simply to mock it.

Latin helps journalist get scoop on Pope
An Italian journalist who beat the world's media on Pope Benedict XVI's decision to resign got the scoop on the utterly unexpected news thanks to her knowledge of Latin.
It's even a reprint from the AFP, bene ego nunquam.

At the end of the article, the journalist's boss remarks "This is a strong argument for culture in training future journalists". I'll say. Take the following story:

Pope Benedict xvi sent out his first tweet in Latin
The Pope finally sent out his first tweet in Latin from his Twitter account @Pontifex_ln on Sunday, January 20, 2013: “Unitati christifidelium integre studentes quid iubet Dominus? Orare semper, iustitiam factitare, amare probitatem, humiles Secum ambulare.”
The Pope immediately followed it up with translations into the languages of his other Twitter accounts. He translated the Latin via his English language account @Pontifex this way: “What does the Lord ask of us as we work for Christian unity? To pray constantly, do justice, love goodness, and walk humbly with Him.”
The Guardian apparently took the phrase corruptio optimi pessima and … erm … corrupted it.
Take the UK’s Guardian newspaper. It is responsible for propagating an erroneous Latin phrase in its reporting on the Pope’s Latin Twitter account. Lizzy Davies in Rome wrote this paragraph for the Guardian, misquoting Roberto Spataro (secretary of the Pontifical Academy for Latin Studies, which Benedict XVI founded last year) and attributing the quote to L’Osservatore Romano:
“Twitter is a tool which requires rapid communication. In English you say ‘the corruption of the best one is horrible’; in Latin, three words suffice: ‘corrupt optima pessima. It is a language which helps to think with precision and sobriety. And it has produced an exceptional heritage of science, knowledge and faith.” 

Assorted links on the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI

I don't want to keep putting up posts on this. It is a little depressing. I want people digging this out of some memory crystal of the first 100 centuries of the internet to say "why did he need to name the Pope in the title of this post? only one Pope in the third millennium resigned". So this post will serve as the dumping ground for any more stories I come across. Fr Alexander Lucie Smith fears

The ordeal awaiting us – watching all and sundry pontificating on all matters Papal and religious. 

Amen, Father.

Apparently the Pope will resign the Papacy exactly 365 days older than Blessed John Paul II was when he died.

 UPDATE 1
The Impossible "Road Map" of Peace with the Lefebvrists
How does Radaelli see the healing of this opposition? In his judgment, “it is not the model of Church obedient to dogma that must once again submit to the pope,” but “it is rather the model obedient to the pope that must once again submit to dogma.”
In other words:
"It is not Ecône [editor's note: the community of the Lefebvrists] that must submit to Rome, but Rome to Heaven: every difficulty between Ecône and Rome will be resolved only after the return of the Church to the dogmatic language that is proper to it.”
That was February 9th. Two days later all bets were off when the present Pope made his declaratio.

Catholic-bashers have embellished the truth about abuse in Catholic institutions. It's time to put the record straight

Brendan O'Neil, secularist agnostic (scroll down), rides to the rescue of the Church in Ireland.

UPDATE 2

Dr Edward Peters asks When will the conclave start? His conclusion is the same as mine (lucky him), i.e. not before 15th March. Also who can be elected Pope? Turns out married men are not excluded, also note the explanation at the end for why the 15 days don't begin until midnight 28th February-1st March (c.203). He also contradicts the assertion that the Cardinals might be able to adjust the start for the next Conclave: "There is nothing ambiguous about the two-week waiting period set out in [Universi Dominici Gregis] 37 and—long story made short—ambiguities in the law, not inconveniences, are what are subject to ‘interpretation’."

UPDATE 3

Tim Stanley lists the ways the mainstream media just doesn't get God or Catholicism.
If someone retired at work, who would you invite to give the farewell speech? Someone who liked and understood them, or someone who hated or never even met them? Parts of the media seem to overwhelmingly favour the latter, which is why we’ve seen the usual suspects wheeled out to give commentary on the abdication – campaigners for women priests, defrocked Marxists, "humanists" and, worst of all, the ubiquitous disgruntled cradle Catholics.

UPDATE 4

There are only two "Vatican watchers" worth reading. That is they know what they are talking about and they appear to have decent sources. John Allen discusses Cardinal Bertone.

(Among "Vatican watchers" I read some poor sap recently who talked about the Vatican having a "Swiss army" – that might be news to André Blattman).

UPDATE 5

The other Vatican watcher worth reading is Sandro Magister.
In the Philippines, which is the only nation in Asia where Catholics are in the majority, there shines a young and cultured cardinal, archbishop of Manila Luis Antonio Tagle, the focus of growing attention. As a theologian and Church historian, Tagle was one of the authors of the monumental history of Vatican Council II published by the progressive “school of Bologna.” But as a pastor, he has demonstrated a balance of vision and a doctrinal correctness that Benedict XVI himself has highly appreciated. Especially striking is the style with which the bishop acts, living simply and mingling among the humblest people, with a great passion for mission and for charity.
The antics of the Bologna school are regularly covered by Magister.

UPDATE 6

An evisceration of a story in the New York Times. Summed up in the opening line:
Gaaaaaaaaaaahhhh.

Scraping the barrel on Pope coverage

The last Pope to resign was Gregory XII who did so on 4th July 1415. But he did so when there were two other claimants (a Benedict XIII and a John XXIII, not to be confused with Pietro Francisco Orsini or Angelo Roncalli) and so it was not immediately clear whether the real Pope was resigning or was being eased out (as the other two claimants were). So far as I know the only other resignation was St Celestine V who did so on 13th December 1294. Pope Benedict visited St Celestine's tomb in July 2010, and left his Pallium there. Anyway those are some facts.

I thought factoids were trivial facts. I was wrong. They are things presented as fact but actually false – such as the sowing of salt into the ruins of Carthage (didn't happen, made up I believe in the 20th century).

Five factoids about Popes and their Appointment.

Edward Peters asks When will the Conclave start?


Further to my theory that everybody in practice acknowledges the vast importance of the Papacy on its own terms, that is spiritually, not merely because he happens to be in charge of the world's largest religion, here are some more links.

Dan Hodges (Glenda Jackson's son) says A black Pope would be the liberal left's worst nightmare. Unlikely. They have no problem going after Clarence Thomas, Archbishop John Sentamu etc.
In a few weeks time they’re going to establish a new Papal Conclave, and when they do, they really need to get Alastair Campbell in there, or Simon Cowell.
This a few shades from Cosmopolitan decrying the election of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger because he would destroy the Catholic Church: We didn't know you cared!

Tim Blair says:
Pope Benedict XVI announces his resignation. I didn't know he was a Labor MP.

Breaking news: Australian federation abolished

In stunning news, the "indissoluble Federal Comonwealth under the Crown" of Australia has been suddenly dissolved by act of media. It has had the effect of making the Australian Senate subject to election by the Australian people as a whole. This can be shown by the announcement the Julian Assange is to stand for the Senate with no mention of in which state he will stand.

NB: If this is otherwise shown to be false then replace the previous paragraph with the following.

In boring non-news, the Australian media are thick and lazy and leave out important pieces of information.

Both Fairfax and News Ltd use the same unadapted AAP story.
JULIAN Assange will run for a Senate seat in the 2013 federal election and his mum reckons he'll be awesome. "He will be awesome," she said.
In other news, my Mum says I am cool, so there.
Christine Assange has confirmed her son's candidacy, after WikiLeaks tweeted the news … Queensland-born Assange, who founded the secret-leaking website WikiLeaks, announced his Senate ambition last December from Ecuador's London embassy.
Possibly he will stand in Queensland. It presumably depends on where he is registered to vote. The last I heard he was going to stand in New South Wales or Victoria. If the former then I will get the indubitable pleasure of putting him last.
He said last year he would run as a Senate candidate under a yet-to-be-formed WikiLeaks party banner and was recruiting others to stand with him. The election will be held on September 14.
Glad they included that last sentence. I might have missed it.

Three metaphors for the price of one

On 4th December 2012 the SMH published A new monarch for Australia? from the AAP. The article discusses the expectations of the child of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Although the only way to abolish the Australian constitutional monarchy short of armed revolution is by referendum, and although the Australian people have never voted Yes to a proposal to which they have already voted No, and although the Australian people voted No to a republic in the referendum of 1999, still for some reason our local monarchy-abolishers are supposed to be relevant.
But Australian republicanism might affect the extent of the new baby's ultimate dominion. Republican fever has gone off the boil since the defeat of the 1999 referendum, but is expected to resurface after the end of Elizabeth II's reign.
We have the metaphor of republicanism as a disease causing fever (couldn't agree more), which is now like a cooking pan taken away from the heat while simultaneously a submerged creature of the sea (a Kraken perhaps?). Doug Conway is "AAP Senior Correspondent".

Does the Pope have a pink bathroom?

(There was a splurge post on Pius xii in this place for a few hours this morning which will be edited and reposted later, in case you are wondering). As is now known all over the interwebs Pope Benedict xvi has written an op-ed [registration required] for the Financial Times which L'Osservatoro Romano helpfully reproduces.

At FT.com "the response of Jesus" in the first paragraph (quoting "render unto Caesar") is hyperlinked to Matthew 22 in the God's Word Translation but "the birth of Christ" at the beginning of the fifth paragraph is hyperlinked to Luke 2 in the New International Version. In both cases it is to the text hosted at BibleGateway.com. All three are Protestant institutions. This is not something to do with previous settings because those are the results when I used a browser with a cleared cache.

The following is at the bottom of the article:

The writer is the Bishop of Rome and author of ‘Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives’

Oh you mean that Pope Benedict xvi!

I imagine an Anglican subeditor having had some fun with all this, but I am sure that is just fantasy.

*The post title is a reference to the following sketch from Not the Nine O'Clock News, which I can't find on YouTube. The FT is printed on pink paper.
Reader 1 (Rowan Atkinson): I buy The Daily Telegraph, because it doesn't try to tell me what to think. It just reports the news. 
Reader 2 (Griff Rhys-Jones): I buy the Daily Express, because it informs me quickly, tells me what's going on, and let's me get on with my job. 
Reader 3 (Mel Smith): I read the Financial Times [beat] because I've got a pink bathroom.

AP, AAP…what's the diff?

Noting clueless use  of wire feeds  by the Australian media is becoming a hobby of mine. You would at least think that when they use them, the media could at least get the name of the source right. Er…no.

Behold a clip from the email newsletter sent out by The Australian on Monday 3rd December 2012:

Two news items about the correspondence of Napoleon? One to do with the Kremlin, one in code? I have to see this.

Napoleon's Kremlin letter sold for $243K  [jpg]

Napoleon's Kremlin letter sold for $243K
From: AAP December 03, 2012 10:03AM
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 A letter from Napoleon Bonaparte has sold at auction for ten times its estimated value at $A235,000. Source: AAP
A SECRET code letter sent by French emperor Napoleon boasting that his multinational forces would blow up Moscow's Kremlin has sold at auction for 187,500 ($A235,000) - 10 times its estimated presale price.

Napoleon's coded letter sells for $233K  [jpg]

From agencies and News Limited publications:
Napoleon's coded letter sells for $233k
From: AP December 03, 2012 5:39AM
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A SECRET coded letter sent by French emperor Napoleon boasting that he would blow up Moscow's Kremlin has sold for 187,500 euros ($A233,000). - [sic] 10 times its estimated presale price.

Leaving aside that grubby little disclaimer ("From agencies…") which is not even text (I can't pick it up with the mouse and cursor) the stories are identical save for two things: the attribution, and the sale price. The AAP and the AP are two entirely separate organisations. The Australian Associated Press is an Australian news agency founded in 1935 by Fairfax and HWT (now owned by News Ltd). The Associated Press is an American news agency founded  in 1846 by New York Newspapers to…you can Askjeeves the rest.

The AAP is actually nearer the mark for the value of €187,500 but the subediting drone could not keep consistent between the headline and the opening paragraph. And some dimwit put both stories in the email bulletin.

(A short time on the interwebs suggests that the story belongs to the AP).