James Barr

From Wikipedia’s article on tyranny

Interesting and damning: of the last govt.

Caerphilly then Suddenly

Liquidambar I think - a bit of an urban street planting staple.

Caerphilly then Suddenly

"People want to understand the past. They want to understand how the past relates to the news today"

In our new episode, @jamesbarr.bsky.social joins Natalia to talk about writing #SWANA history for Western audiences & how imperial archives still shape what stories get told ➡️ bit.ly/ep6_OSP_barr

The refs to Idi Amin remind me that that noted left-winger Michael Howard wrote a paper for the Bow Group in 1970 arguing in favour of making it easier for Ugandan and Kenyan Asians to come and live in Britain.

“Polymath”

It is really striking (he says having cleared an attic recently) how stuff that reached the UK wasn’t made in China pre 2001.

The smartphone itself is perhaps most important as the delivery mechanism. I would (with hindsight) place China entering the WTO above the GWOT.

Had you asked this question with any specific example (especially anything involving the magic word Churchill) the answers would have been different.

There is too much polling. I do not care what Janan Ganesh thinks of the great man theory of history. I care even less what the general public thinks about it. Historical theory is not settled by doorstep opinion popularity contests. Stop asking people stupid questions now please.

A great example of why pollsters are a waste of space

Let me steer you with “broader”

Nothing beside remains

Whose side are you on? Finding out that you have been spied on by the Chinese Communist Party feels like a violation, learning that the British government has failed to prosecute, feels like a betrayal.

Good piece, worth reading

In the C20th the French and then Syrian govts were obsessed by these migrations, which they saw as destabilising.

Elizabeth Key Fowden’s book The Barbarian Plain is good on how Resafa (ancient Sergiopolis) stood on key migration routes and this (the northerly set of dark grey/light grey bars) shows this nicely (albeit the best part of 1,500 years later)

From Adnan Mahhouk’s 1956 article “Recent Agricultural Development and Bedouin Settlement in Syria”

Via @akmckeever.bsky.social this map showing tribal migrations into Syria in the 50s caught my eye

That’s a good map

It is.

Or perhaps more accurately, the CPS abandoned case when it became clear the govt would not provide this evidence.

This is interesting. If the case had gone to trial it seems to me the prosecution would have had to prove Berry knowingly met Cai Qi, raising the question about how HMG knew he had. If the collapse of the trial lies with HMG rather than CPS incompetence as some say, I wonder if this was the issue.

This advert intrigues me. Anyway I am grateful to M. Carmignac for subsidising my FT subscription

This is interesting. If the case had gone to trial it seems to me the prosecution would have had to prove Berry knowingly met Cai Qi, raising the question about how HMG knew he had. If the collapse of the trial lies with HMG rather than CPS incompetence as some say, I wonder if this was the issue.

“as low as”

This recently re-appeared on my twitter timeline, so I thought I'd share it here. It's a list of books for escaping into, compiled during the very first lockdown. They're all personal favourites, pulled out of my memory and so not in any way definitive.

Yes the signage is not as good as it could be and that encourages cynicism that it is a revenue raising measure.

Bit fed up of the four rings of an Audi badge filling much of my rear-view mirror.

I’ve done a couple of holidays in Wales since the limit was brought in. Last summer I felt that it was generally being adhered to; this summer I felt under constant pressure from drivers behind when I obeyed the law.