Something interesting (h/t Jamie) about the Chinese military. The strand I found worthwhile is this: As a result, for the past decade, a major theme pounded into the troops by the General Political Department is the persistent threat from outside forces (non-Party elements) to separate the military from politics, depoliticize the military and “nationalize” the…
Read More Peasants into…potential CCP membersSo, Bradford West. Chris Brooke already made the point that everyone and his dog has written a Why The Bradford West Result Means We Should Support My Politics. Meanwhile the jamiesphere is having some sort of left-of-the-left carnival of the marginally relevant, although to be honest that could be the banner over the entrance to…
Read More Why Bradford West means we should…Here’s a story from the Grauniad about privatised forensics lab LGC getting it Very Wrong Indeed. Now here’s another. LGC said one of its staff members made a “typographical error” while inputting code, leading Scotland Yard to spend more than a year trying to trace a non-existent suspect. It was confirmed last month, when LGC…
Read More utterly predictable and indeed predictedFedorcio out they cry! See also this New Yorker piece on Viktor Bout. On April 26, 2005, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), in the Treasury Department, unveiled sanctions aimed at Bout, thirty companies associated with him, and Chichakli. That morning, F.B.I. agents went to Chichakli’s home, in Texas, to search his office. They…
Read More out!I had a request on Twitter for more Francis Maude blogging. (Not another one who wants flogging, I said, wearily pulling on the boots and polishing up the cat-‘o-nine-tails.) This obsession goes back to this post of Tom Barry’s which identified him as: being the real power behind the entire administration, and making everyone forget…
Read More Exactly what you’ll be missing when Francis Maude gets sackedThis comment at Inspector Gadget makes a lot of sense, and makes the various efforts by the Tories to convince their base (and themselves) that It’s The Miners All Over Again look even sillier. I spoke to the owner of my local garage earlier today. He has 8 pumps on the forecourt, “as a rule”…
Read More PR men who are incompetent, or men who are incompetent at PR?