Why Rupert Murdoch considers it worth his while to pay David Aaronovitch a large six figure sum for such puerile antics as tweeting that I am insane, is a conjecture I find difficult to resolve. Today this exchange occurred on twitter:
David Aaronovitch: This suggestion that if elected Corbyn could be quickly ousted is utter bollocks. Democracy allows Labour to commit Hara Kiri.
Mark Doran: @DAaronovitch I hope everyone is watching how these servants of the micro-elite try to paint “attracting popular support” as “committing suicide.”
Mark Doran: @DAaronovitch Craig finds the elite-serving contortions every bit as funny as I do
David Aaronovitch: @MarkJDoran I tend to find Craig Murray unpersuasive on the grounds of him being unhinged. I can see why you like him, though.
Mark Doran: Says the man who managed to find Bush and Blair credible. I can see why you liked them, though.
It is remarkably ironic that on being referred to an article which argues that views outside a very narrow neoliberal establishment narrative are marginalised and ridiculed by the media, the Murdoch hack’s response is that the author is unhinged. Aaronovitch could not have more neatly proved my point.
But something else struck me about the twitter record. Aaronovitch’ twitter account claims to have 78,000 followers. Yet of the 78,000 people who allegedly received his tweet about my insanity, only 1 retweeted and 2 favourited. That is an astonishingly low proportion – 1 in 26,000 reacted. To give context, Mark Doran has only 582 followers and yet had more retweets and favourites for his riposte. 1 in 146 to be precise, a 200 times greater response rate.
Please keep reading, I promise you this gets a great deal less boring.
Eighteen months ago I wrote an article about Aaronovitch’s confession that he solicits fake reviews of his books to boost their score on Amazon. In response a reader emailed me with an analysis of Aaronovitch’s twitter followers. He argued with the aid of graphs that the way they accrued indicated that they were not arising naturally, but being purchased in blocks. He claimed this was common practice in the Murdoch organisation to promote their hacks through false apparent popularity.
I studied his graphs at some length, and engaged in email correspondence on them. I concluded that the evidence was not absolutely conclusive, and in fairness to Aaronovitch I declined to publish, to the annoyance of my correspondent.
Naturally this came to mind again today when I noted that Aaronovitch’ tweets to his alleged legion of followers in fact tumble into a well of silence. I do not even tweet. The entire limit of my tweeting is that this blog automatically tweets the titles of articles I write. They are not aphorisms so not geared to retweet. Yet even the simple tweet “Going Mainstream” which marked the article Aaronovitch derided, obtained 20 times the reactions of Aaronovitch’s snappy denunciation of my mental health. This despite the fact he has apparently 10 times more followers than me. An initial survey seems to show this is not atypical.
In logic, I can only see two possible explanations. The first is that my correspondent was right and Aaronovitch fakes twitter followers like he does book reviews. The second is that he has a vast army of followers, nearly all of whom find him dull and uninspiring, and who heartily disapproved en masse of his slur on my sanity. I opt for the second explanation, that he is just extremely dull, on the grounds that Mr Aaronovitch’s honesty and probity were never questioned, m’Lud.
“As for personal attacks calling nationalist and I am one Nazi’s is a personal attack you ignorant tosser.”
No it isn’t retard Nationalism is not a person.
However your numerous Holocaust denial posts did rather give the game away as to your nature.
“However your numerous Holocaust denial posts did rather give the game away as to your nature.”
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A pathetic attempt to divert, what has holocaust denial got to do with you calling nationalists not nationalism dummy, Nazi’s?
My nature? That’s rich coming from a guy who resorts to replying with “f*ck off and die” when confronted with the truth.
“A pathetic attempt to divert, what has holocaust denial got to do with you calling nationalists not nationalism dummy, Nazi’s?”
Just saying, you were the one defending the Nazis and trying to belittle their genocide of the Jews in Europe last August not me.
Chunky Mark is just starting to realise that he lives in a police state…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=howOTM7DPE4
Thanks Beth. Strange that Counterpunch took it off??
It is here from his blog.
http://sjlendman.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/illegitimate-show-trial-sentences.html
I sometimes listen to him on the radio. A good man who is awake and sees the evil.
For those that haven’t seen it, here’s Jeremy Corbyn on Channel Four News recently:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZAn7ZEvwek
@Habbabkuk (la vita e’ bella)
29 Jul, 2015 – 7:58 pm
Perhaps instead of indulging in personal attacks on the posters here, you could actually engage in the policies that Jeremy Corbyn puts forward?
The silence is golden, beyond the usual comic book stuff that those without an arguement usually put forth.
[ ————– ]
Ref BBC and the squelching of the SaVile story. Boaden and Rippon survived.
Meirion Jones: ‘Everyone on right side of the Savile argument has been forced out of the BBC’
29 July 2015
http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/meirion-jones-speaks-out-everyone-who-was-right-side-savile-argument-has-been-forced-out-bbc
NB Some BBC stooges in the comments.
‘BBC bosses “forced out” staff who tried to expose the corporation’s mistakes over the Jimmy Savile scandal because they viewed them as “traitors”, according to the former head of investigations at Newsnight.’
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/jul/29/bbc-savile-expose-newsnight-meirion-jones
~~~
There is definitely a cover up. Even Dame Janet Smith’s report has been kicked into the proverbial long grass.
BBC Jimmy Savile abuse report delayed at police request
Metropolitan police says publication of Dame Janet Smith’s report could prejudice ongoing investigations
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/may/01/bbc-jimmy-savile-abuse-report-police-dame-janet-smith
1 May 2015
The aim of ******s (stick in here the word I have been told not to use) is to divert attention from the issues. Engaging in personal attacks on commenters is an effective way to accomplish that end, if people allow themselves to be taken in.
“Traitors” in what sense? Traitors to the BBC, or traitors to the whole corporate state?
From the Guardian article about Savile:
And that no doubt is the view the political establishment takes of reports about the Westminster pedophile ring.
Just saying, you were the one defending the Nazis and trying to belittle their genocide of the Jews in Europe last August not me.”
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Their’s a big difference between defending the Nazi’s and questioning the figure killed that was my point.
If I were defending the Nazi’s why then, would I castigate you for calling nationalists Nazi’s, it just doesn’t add up.
You however, call SNP supporters and independence supporters Nazi’s and Brownshirts, where’s you evidence?
“…. 42% at this stage, regardless of how great the lead over his nearest rival, is insufficient to indicate a Corbyn victory.”
I think that you are wrong (pessimistic) about this: the electorate is wide and human, many of those voting for favourite sons (and daughters) are likely to pick Corbyn as their second choice. For example some of the likely voters have said that they find it hard to choose between Kendall and Corbyn while rejecting the obviously phoney Cooper-Burnham duo.
If Corbyn gets 40% of the first preferences he will almost certainly win.
As to Holocaust Denial perhaps the most common form it takes-and has done ever since Operation Paperclip days- is that of equating the Soviet Union with Nazi Germany, and Stalin with Hitler. Once that has been done, and the millions of Communists, Trade Unionists, Gypsies and social ‘deviants’ poured down the memory hole, the Holocaust becomes an episode not much more significant than the bloodbath in the Congo, still ongoing with a death meter in the six million vicinity, or the retreat from Imphal in the last war which led to the deaths of some millions of Bengalis. Not to mention the systematic killing of muslims since the Iran-Iraq war (cleverly sponsored by our governments) through to the current conflicts in Yemen, Syria and Iraq.
“bloodbath in the Congo, still ongoing with a death meter in the six million vicinity, or the retreat from Imphal in the last war which led to the deaths of some millions of Bengalis. Not to mention the systematic killing of muslims since the Iran-Iraq war (cleverly sponsored by our governments) through to the current conflicts in Yemen, Syria and Iraq.”
______________________________
Bevin
Yes indeed the Congo bloodbath hasn’t received the attention it should have.
Here is a excellent documentary on Patrice Lumumba.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2UkAFGecf-E
For those of you who don’t recall the Belgian bloodbath in the Congo here’s Patrice Lumumba an overview recap, and his struggle.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrice_Lumumba
The Australian:
Greece’s former finance minister Yanis Varoufakis faces treason charges (for exploring the possibility of reverting to a different currency from the Euro). Treason!
The whole of Europe is quickly turning into a police state,
T***** also thrive in a vacuum where their niceties exist without a response, giving them more gravitas than knocking down their droppings
“Their’s a big difference between defending the Nazi’s and questioning the figure killed that was my point.”
No there isn’t. Holocaust denial is what Neo Nazis do.
Andy Burnham on the Tories and SNP, tax and welfare; a Channel Four interview from a few months back. Can anyone explain to me what Burnham is actually saying..?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mLNl7GUXlI
Holocaust denier David Irving spoke at a secret neo-Nazi meeting in London last Saturday.
http://www.rt.com/uk/310878-holocaust-denier-irving-speaks/
Raul Hilberg, perhaps the leading authority on the Holocaust and an Austrian-born Jew, gave a figure of 5,1 million Jews (in a range between 4.8 and 5.4 million) as having been killed in the Holocaust. So obviously it is possible to question the 6 million figure without being an anti-Semite.
@Fred – Did you actually read RepublicOfScotland’s sentence before replying to it to say “no there isn’t”?
Plus it wasn’t ONLY Jews who perished. 6 million of other persuasions…Catholic Priests, Bahai, Jehovah’s Witnesses and countless political enemies.
Yvette Cooper on the BBC Andrew Marr show a few months back. Once again, what is Cooper actually saying. What are the policies..?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BW2dLHWuROA
Holocaust denial is what Neo Nazis do.
Sure, possibly even a majority of them. Though as one of the key definitions of a neonazi is that they deny the holocaust, that is less than astounding news. Suggest you familiarise yourself with the basics of Venn diagrams, too. Perhaps I should point out that Craig is a nationalist and strongly disapproves of holocaust denial*, as, lacking as usual any substantiation from you of the alternative, I am entitled to state definitively, do the majority of the SNP.
*Matter of repeated record. And the odd banning.
I listened to Craig on R4. No doubt he will be giving us his take. The R4 interviewers were not very nice. but I thought that he didn’t insist enough that the issue with Sewell is not his sexual activities, a personal affair, but rather his use of public resources to do it.
Once again the BBC Marr show, and a recent car crash interview with Liz Kendall…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zItOPhu8noY
Yet again, what is Kendall actually saying?
All these people, Kendall, Cooper and Burnham are, potentially, vying to be the prime minister of the UK.
I wouldn’t put any of them in charge of a car park; and to balance that, I wouldn’t put Cameron & Co in charge of a children’s playground.
And now Turkey has hired a crack team of D.C. lobbyists: Turkey’s Political Influence Felt as Washington Turns Its Back on Kurds Fighting ISIS:
Sibel Edmonds has described in her earlier writings the extent to which Denny Hastert supported Turkey during his career in the House, and also how he was being blackmailed for his sexual indiscretions.
Counterpunch: The Politics of Betrayal: Obama Backstabs Kurds to Appease Turkey:
Absolutely disgusting. But it certainly does expose the incoherence of the alleged Western war against ISIS.
“Perhaps I should point out that Craig is a nationalist and strongly disapproves of holocaust denial”
Do you remember the reason he gave?
Newsweek;
“If past reports are true, convicted spy Jonathan Pollard could have about $1 million waiting for him in a Swiss bank account when he is released from federal prison on parole in November. Pollard, whose release was announced on Tuesday, has served nearly 30 years for supplying the Israeli government with classified U.S. intelligence documents.
Pollard’s new problem: how to get to the cash, and when. According to multiple past reports based on the statements of United States investigators, Israeli intelligence paid Pollard $50,000 by the time he was arrested in 1985, on top of lavish gifts, and promised to deposit $30,000 a year for him in a secret Swiss bank account. The original 10-year deal could have amounted to as much as $540,000, officials said when he went to jail. But if the Israelis continued the payments to their captured spy—a common practice of major espionage agencies the world over—then Pollard could be in line for a $1 million payday, or more.
News of Pollard claiming such a reward, however, could touch off a firestorm in the already rocky relations between the U.S. and Israel.
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