Astonishingly, the BBC has titled a Have Your Say discussion Should homosexuals face execution? (it relates to a proposed Ugandan law making homosexuality a capital offence).
Much less surprisingly, the majority of the most recommended comments are anti-gay (although some of the anti-gay posters, in a startling display of liberalism, think that execution is going a bit far).
When are we going to get over this idea that commenting on news articles is a useful function?
From: David Mitchell’s Observer column:
Caring about Europe is something else I feel I ought to do. I read a lot of newspapers, but I can seldom wrench my eyes on to articles about the EU. They slide rebelliously on to something more interesting like an advert for life insurance or a picture of Ed Balls. I strain again desperately, like Superman trying to put a kryptonite suitcase into an overhead locker: “Must care… about… Lisbon Treaty! Got to develop… opinion on democratic… deficit!” But to no avail.
I know it’s all very important, I just don’t feel it is. When someone moans about Brussels, I nod along seriously, thinking: “I bet it’s fine really. I don’t give a shit.” Whereas when a pro-European talks about the benefits of European integration, I think: “I bet it’s not that great. I don’t give a shit.”
I reckon I’m not alone. Only a minority behave as if the EU matters and most of them hate it. From Eurosceptic Tories, through Ukip to the BNP, the people who frequently mention Europe are the ones who find it annoying. It’s doing something to them they loathe. I’m not sure what it’s doing to me, but I don’t think I mind, largely because those who do generally seem like twats.
And it’s not just the EU. I am sure that more public attention was paid to the outcome of last week’s Man U/Liverpool game than is paid to almost any Government policy announcement.
Busy day so no time for thoughts on referendums which will need to wait till tomorrow. However, I did find out that today might be a very good day to celebrate evidence-based policy-making.
It’s a day to reflect on one of humankind’s greatest achievements.
Yes, forty years ago today, after millions of man-hours’ work and dedication, the bar-room policy wonk’s greatest non-sequitur was created.
There were shouts of joy in Mission Control as word came through, and a listening world heard the famous words “If they can put a man on the moon, why can’t they…”
Sadly, crackle on the line obscured the rest of the historic non-sequitur, but it had blazed a trail that many others would follow. Now it belongs to the ages.
Brendan Nyhan discusses the ways in which US political blog Politico dances to the beat of the page-view drum.
Here are a thousand words from xkcd that summarise the attitude most internet commenters seem to have.
The Have Your Say mosh pit on the BBC is not happy about the new Speaker. One says, summing up the mood:
So the clear favourite on this site, Anne Widecombe didn’t get a look in. Seems like the old boys club will continue.
Yes, why did MPs not listen to Have Your Say, the authentic considered voice of the people? That wouldn’t lead them astray.
An article in Wired from 1997 looks at this strange thing called aNetizen
The European elections may be over, but who really matters in Brussels? The FT has a gallery of the 30 biggest players on the EU stage. It’s notable that only one is under forty – and she’s thirty-nine.
I really liked this quote from Weber on politics as a vocation, which I saw (via Paulie) on DSTPFW:
“Politics is a strong and slow boring of hard boards. It takes both passion and perspective. Certainly all historical experience confirms the truth –that man would not have attained the possible unless time and again he had reached out for the impossible. But to do that a man must be a leader, and not only a leader but a hero as well, in a very sober sense of the word. And even those who are neither leaders nor heroes must arm themselves with that steadfastness of heart which can brave even the crumbling of all hopes. This is necessary right now, or else men will not be able to attain even that which is possible today. Only he has the calling for politics who is sure that he shall not crumble when the world from his point of view is too stupid or too base for what he wants to offer. Only he who in the face of all this can say ‘In spite of all!’ has the calling for politics.”