Even Politicians Can Have Holidays
There was an article in The Independent newspaper the other day, that I felt I had to respond to. The following is a copy of that response, that I sent to the paper with the hope that they might include it in their Letters page:-
EVEN POLITICIANS CAN HAVE HOLIDAYS
I refer to the article by Cahal Milmo (28/12/06) entitled 'With friends like these...', concerning the Prime Minister's holidays.
As an avid Independent reader of about 2/3 months, I was shocked by the substituition of normal, sensible, reasoned criticism of a politician's work, with the scurrilous, shabby treatment of the Blairs' off-duty breaks, and the attempt to blur the gap between the two. Even politicians are allowed holidays. The writer made every effort to smear the Prime Minister and his wife, with a variety of illogical, non-arguments. If Sir Cliff Richard has offered hospitality to the Blairs, and this has been accepted on four different occasions, doesn't that sound like the perfect holiday arrangement - and of course Sir Cliff would keep it quiet, as it was a private holiday. We are not told about wonderful freebie holidays the writer has received - and I don't want to know, thank you - that's private as well.
Why can't Mr. Blair play Bajan folk songs on holiday - I didn't know it was banned. Robin Gibb is described as an ageing celebrity or the 57-year-old disco star. I didn't know it was a crime to age, or to be successful. Why can't he and Mr. Blair be friends - and for one to offer the other somewhere to stay for a holiday?
Kind regards,
Barrie Gordon
So, that was the letter I sent to The Independent on Thursday. I think it unlikely that they will publish it for several reasons, including simply that they might not have room on the Letters page. However, there is a 'longer' response, particularly as the paper compounded the problem by featuring another article, this time by a different writer, but written along very similar lines, in Friday's edition. This article ran under the title: 'Mystery of the Blairs' £50, 000 holiday at Gibb home deepens' by Terri Judd.
At this point I was going to go back to the 28th December report, but on looking at it again, it is such a cesspit of comments, that I'm going to review the 'Mystery' story instead. First off, there seems to be no mystery - so at this point there is no story. Any amount of money is immaterial. Renting a holiday place, for a few pounds or millions is not relevant. I obviously would agree that if public funds were used for a private holiday, then that would be a very serious matter, requiring Mr. Blair to account for his actions and so on, but no case is made in these two articles for that. The writer does talk about the possibility of money going to charity. Isn't that a good thing? No, it wouldn't be, if it came from taxpayers, but as I said, no argument has been constructed.
The 'Mystery' writer spends much time conjecturing about possible air fares - how much would it have cost and all that - for no reason. There's talk about Mr. Blair calling Robin Gibb a 'hero' . So what?! And, to cap it all, the writer reports that bookmakers are already offering odds on the personality that would host the Blair's next family holiday.....and the relevance is?? He can go on holiday, staying at the house of a 'mere mortal' or a 'personality'. It doesn't matter which, but it is important that he's afforded the privacy we all expect for ourselves.
Finally, why does the 'Mystery' article appear in the section headed: Home. Politics. when the story is clearly about neither.
My New Year's resolution, quickly formed over the last few days, is to read The Independent less. I would have said 'never again' but I still do like Tracey Emin's column on a Friday, and there are interesting articles, on art and such like, but when you can't trust a paper to publish their 'serious' articles with accuracy and fairness, then things have reached a sorry state. In the 29th December edition there was a report on the artist Norman Rockwell - or rather the family financial disputes that have arisen since his death. I think that was the gist of the article, but because I was having doubts about the validity of the articles in the paper, and I have thrown most of the paper out, I can't tell you exactly what it was about. The reason I didn't read it fully, was that I didn't know it was the truth, and I didn't want to be misled.
A hope for 2007, is that the quality of journalism improves, not only in The Independent, but elsewhere as well. It would be useful, as an experiment in improvement, for example, for The Independent to publish yet again one of their daily editions as a Special Edition. The print would be exactly the same as the original, except that some of the purported factual reports would have a line through them to indicate that they infact were neither factual nor fair, if that were the case. In the long run, both the paper and the public, would benefit where genuine trust could be established.
As an avid Independent reader of about 2/3 months, I was shocked by the substituition of normal, sensible, reasoned criticism of a politician's work, with the scurrilous, shabby treatment of the Blairs' off-duty breaks, and the attempt to blur the gap between the two. Even politicians are allowed holidays. The writer made every effort to smear the Prime Minister and his wife, with a variety of illogical, non-arguments. If Sir Cliff Richard has offered hospitality to the Blairs, and this has been accepted on four different occasions, doesn't that sound like the perfect holiday arrangement - and of course Sir Cliff would keep it quiet, as it was a private holiday. We are not told about wonderful freebie holidays the writer has received - and I don't want to know, thank you - that's private as well.
Why can't Mr. Blair play Bajan folk songs on holiday - I didn't know it was banned. Robin Gibb is described as an ageing celebrity or the 57-year-old disco star. I didn't know it was a crime to age, or to be successful. Why can't he and Mr. Blair be friends - and for one to offer the other somewhere to stay for a holiday?
Kind regards,
Barrie Gordon
So, that was the letter I sent to The Independent on Thursday. I think it unlikely that they will publish it for several reasons, including simply that they might not have room on the Letters page. However, there is a 'longer' response, particularly as the paper compounded the problem by featuring another article, this time by a different writer, but written along very similar lines, in Friday's edition. This article ran under the title: 'Mystery of the Blairs' £50, 000 holiday at Gibb home deepens' by Terri Judd.
At this point I was going to go back to the 28th December report, but on looking at it again, it is such a cesspit of comments, that I'm going to review the 'Mystery' story instead. First off, there seems to be no mystery - so at this point there is no story. Any amount of money is immaterial. Renting a holiday place, for a few pounds or millions is not relevant. I obviously would agree that if public funds were used for a private holiday, then that would be a very serious matter, requiring Mr. Blair to account for his actions and so on, but no case is made in these two articles for that. The writer does talk about the possibility of money going to charity. Isn't that a good thing? No, it wouldn't be, if it came from taxpayers, but as I said, no argument has been constructed.
The 'Mystery' writer spends much time conjecturing about possible air fares - how much would it have cost and all that - for no reason. There's talk about Mr. Blair calling Robin Gibb a 'hero' . So what?! And, to cap it all, the writer reports that bookmakers are already offering odds on the personality that would host the Blair's next family holiday.....and the relevance is?? He can go on holiday, staying at the house of a 'mere mortal' or a 'personality'. It doesn't matter which, but it is important that he's afforded the privacy we all expect for ourselves.
Finally, why does the 'Mystery' article appear in the section headed: Home. Politics. when the story is clearly about neither.
My New Year's resolution, quickly formed over the last few days, is to read The Independent less. I would have said 'never again' but I still do like Tracey Emin's column on a Friday, and there are interesting articles, on art and such like, but when you can't trust a paper to publish their 'serious' articles with accuracy and fairness, then things have reached a sorry state. In the 29th December edition there was a report on the artist Norman Rockwell - or rather the family financial disputes that have arisen since his death. I think that was the gist of the article, but because I was having doubts about the validity of the articles in the paper, and I have thrown most of the paper out, I can't tell you exactly what it was about. The reason I didn't read it fully, was that I didn't know it was the truth, and I didn't want to be misled.
A hope for 2007, is that the quality of journalism improves, not only in The Independent, but elsewhere as well. It would be useful, as an experiment in improvement, for example, for The Independent to publish yet again one of their daily editions as a Special Edition. The print would be exactly the same as the original, except that some of the purported factual reports would have a line through them to indicate that they infact were neither factual nor fair, if that were the case. In the long run, both the paper and the public, would benefit where genuine trust could be established.
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Happy New Year
posted by Barrie Gordon at 2:06 PM
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