Getting things done, Daily Mail style

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Interesting column by Martin Kettle…

If you live cocooned and, dare one say it, comfortable on Planet Guardian, then maybe you have not yet fully reflected on why this week’s Daily Mail’s campaign to Banish the Bags has been both so brilliantly effective, orchestrating the endorsements of Marks & Spencer and the prime minister within its first 48 hours, and also so politically interesting. But you should. It’s important.

The Daily Mail did not invent the issue of plastic bag pollution. Paul Dacre’s newspaper is a Johnny-come-lately to a long-established environmental cause. It is 20 years since Labour’s Chris Smith first raised the issue in the House of Commons and six since Ireland and Bangladesh caught the world’s attention by slapping a tax on them. You can find hundreds of speeches by ministers saying something must be done. But until the Mail’s campaign ministers were still – there is no other word for it – dithering.

Once the Mail went into action the outcome was settled. Ten pages on Wednesday, seven more on Thursday, another four on Friday and the job was done. The Banish the Bags campaign was well planned, well focused, well judged, well timed and was executed on a scale and with a ruthlessness that would have impressed Bismarck. M&S was lined up in advance to create a second-day wave with its 5p-per-bag charge announcement. Even Prince Harry could not shove the campaign off the front page yesterday, as Gordon Brown, who now recycles his garden waste instead of his policy announcements, pledged that the government would “step in and act”…

Hmmm…. He’s right about the amazing inability of the current government to assign meaningful priorities and get on with what’s important. But then one remembers that Mussolini got the trains to run on time…

Yo! Prof Blair

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P.G. Wodehouse’s shrewd observation that a strong interest in religion is invariably a prelude to insanity is brought to mind by the news that Tony Blair is to ‘teach’ at Yale. Here’s the announcement:

New Haven, Conn. — Yale University is pleased to announce the appointment of Prime Minister Tony Blair as the Howland Distinguished Fellow for the next academic year.

Mr. Blair will lead a seminar at Yale and participate in a number of events around the campus. The course in which he will participate with Yale faculty will examine issues of faith and globalization. His efforts at Yale relate to the work of the Tony Blair Faith Foundation that he will be launching later this year.

The Deans of the Yale School of Management and Divinity are working with Mr. Blair on finalizing details of the program….

If you take that last sentence literally, it would seem that Yale has a School of Management and Divinity, but then I suppose the poor dears were so excited they hardly noticed what they’d written.

Coincidentally, George W. Bush is an alumnus of Yale (where he spent many happy days under the table). Perhaps he will be a Distinguished Guest Lecturer in Professor Blair’s seminar programme? Truly, you couldn’t make this up. What hope have comedians when reality doles out developments like this?

Through the keynote

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On Tuesday, I went to Torquay to give the opening Keynote at the Naace Annual Strategic Conference. I confessed at the beginning that I was never sure what the purpose of a Keynote was, but said that I thought it was akin to a sermon, which reminded me of a passage from Trollope’s Barchester Towers that I’d been reading in the train on the way down.

There is, perhaps, no greater hardship at present inflicted on mankind in civilised and free countries, than the necessity of listening to sermons. No one but a preaching clergyman has, in these realms, the power of compelling an audience to sit silent, and be tormented. No one but a preaching clergyman can revel in platitudes, truisms, and untruisms, and yet receive, as his undisputed privilege, the same respectful demeanour as thought words of impassioned eloquence, or persuasive logic, fell from his lips.

I then launched into my farrago of “platitudes, truisms, and untruisms” about our changing media ecosystem and was heard respectfully. It was blogged live by Ian Usher, who did a remarkable job. For which, many thanks.

The lawyers are coming

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From this week’s Economist…

But the fact remains that even after her wins this week, [Mrs Clinton] is well behind in the race for elected delegates, by roughly 1,360 to 1,220. That might not sound that much. But delegates are awarded proportionally and there are now only ten states left in play, some of them favourable to Barack Obama. He will almost certainly finish ahead in terms of elected delegates. So, Mrs Clinton’s only hope is to persuade the 796 “superdelegates” (members of Congress, senior party officials and other bigwigs) to reverse the elected delegate outcome—and push her over the 2,025 target.

This is where everything could turn ugly (and it is hardly pleasant at the moment). Mrs Clinton will need to present the superdelegates with an excuse to overturn the verdict of all those caucuses and primaries. It is still possible that she could win the popular vote, especially if she triumphs in Pennsylvania: that would help her case enormously. She will also no doubt point out that she has won in all of America’s biggest states, bar Illinois and Georgia, as well as several swing states, including Ohio. But Mr Obama will have powerful arguments of his own, such as his appeal to independents and his victory in Virginia. So the chances are that Mrs Clinton sooner or later will resort to a somewhat legal approach: asking the superdelegate-judges in effect to dismiss the verdict of the first trial on the basis that the procedure was unfair.

Imagine the scene: a posse of (mostly white) VIPs overturning a popular choice: a black man.

In praise of tech support

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Caller: Hey, can you help me? My computer has locked up, and no matter how many times I type eleven, it won’t unfreeze.

Tech Support: What do you mean, “type eleven?”

Caller: The message on my screen says, “Error Type 11!”

From David Pogue.

Swiss bank sees reason? Surely not

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It’s the next stage in the WikiLeaks story. According to the New York Times Blog today,

A Swiss bank on Wednesday moved to withdraw a lawsuit that it had filed against a Web site that it claimed had displayed stolen documents revealing confidential information about the accounts of the bank’s clients.

Lawyers involved in the case said the move by Bank Julius Baer most likely ends its battle against Wikileaks, a Web site that allows people to post documents anonymously “to be of assistance to people of all regions who wish to reveal unethical behavior in their governments and corporations.”

The bank last month obtained an order from U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White in San Francisco that obstructed, but did not absolutely prevent, access to material posted on Wikileaks by turning off the domain name wikileaks.org. The judge’s action drew a flurry of media attention and a barrage of legal filings by media and other organizations arguing that the order violated the freedom of speech protected by the First Amendment.

After a hearing on Friday, Judge White withdrew that order, saying that he was worried about its First Amendment implications and that he thought it might not be possible to prevent viewing of the documents once they had been posted on the Web anyway.

It’s been a huge PR disaster for them — and succeeded mainly in convincing people that there might be something fishy going on. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot!