Matthew Carr's Blog, page 42

Open Letter to Tristram Hunt

Dear Tristram Hunt MP, You have probably never heard of me, and there is no reason why you should.  But I felt moved to write to you because a rather freakish and unusual series of events has brought our names into … Continue reading →

My life as a fascist sympathizer

No writer can be entirely assured that readers will understand  what they write in the way that they want, but there are times when you really wonder whether some of the people who read what you have actually written have … Continue reading →

Mr Benn Goes Bombing

The government predictably won its debate over whether to extend British air strikes into Syria last night.  Unlike 2013, there was never really any doubt the result.  Cameron had his party behind him, in addition to the Liberal Democrats, the … Continue reading →

Corbyn’s rebels

Lyndon Johnson once said of F.B.I. Director J. Edgar Hoover that ” It’s probably better to have him inside the tent pissing out, than outside the tent pissing in.”  Perhaps that was the rationale behind Jeremy Corbyn’s decision to pack … Continue reading →

We Bomb Therefore We Are

Many people who have never read a word of military history or strategy will have come across the Prussian military theorist Carl von Clausewitz’s famous dictum that ‘war is politics (policy) by other means.’   If wars are fought in pursuit … Continue reading →

Pitiless War

The Narodnik revolutionary Vera Figner once described terrorism as a ‘very sombre form struggle.’  Figner spent twenty years in prison for her part in the assassination of Tsar Alexander II – the most high-profile assassination of the nineteenth century and … Continue reading →

Murder in the City of Light

Let’s get one thing straight: the responsibility for last night’s disgusting massacre in Paris belongs to the shrunken specimens of humanity that carried them out and the organization that sent them to do it.  The attacks are yet more evidence … Continue reading →

It’s Official: Stop the War is responsible for the Syrian Civil War

I am not a member of the Stop the War Coalition, but I have been part of the movement ever since it developed in the lead up to the Iraq War.  STW often puts my blogposts on their website, and … Continue reading →

Fortress Europe Book Launch

Next week sees the publication of the paperback edition of Fortress Europe, and I’ve got a couple of events coming up in London to mark the occasion.  On Wednesday at 6.30 I’ll be at the Waterstones in Trafalgar Square  in … Continue reading →

Snobbery is Good for You

Today, while waiting to have my hair cut, I happened to come across a Howard Jacobson article in the weekly Independent about Germaine Greer.   This wasn’t an unexpected or a guilty pleasure.  I rarely find reading Jacobson a pleasure at … Continue reading →