Author: Jacques René Zammit

This was the week of tsunamis, earthquakes and missile tests. It was the week when an EU inquiry finally found that Georgia was to blame for starting the Georgia-Russia war (and that Russia over-reacted). It was the week in which the Chinese People’s Republic celebrated its 60th year of communism, the G20 summit ended with a commitment to create a global framework to balance economies and the week in which the people of Guinea and Honduras respectively rose against their governments.

These were the seven days in which Christian Democrat Angela Merkel (Germany) and Socialist José Socrates (Portugal), with their watered-down policies, were returned to government with a weaker position than the one they occupied prior to the elections. They were the last few days for Irish voters to decide whether to vote yes or no (again) to the Lisbon Treaty. They were also the days of the last Labour conference for Gordon Brown before next year’s June election. It was in an interview with The Telegraph that Labour’s Business Secretary and former EU Commissioner Lord Mandelson conceded that he would be prepared to accept a job working for the future Conservative government.

Lord Mandelson’s claim to be willing to work for the interests of his country in the future, even if the party in government might not be the one for which he is a main canvasser in the forthcoming election, did cause some raised eyebrows. Some evil, evil wags might even imply that Mandy might be sniffing the wind of change (or the inevitable punishment to be meted out to a dry Labour government, bereft of ideas) and be preparing to jump ship. Weirdly enough, nobody explored Lord Mandelson’s sexual preferences, marital status or economic situation. Nobody in the English press stooped so low as to speculate whether his possible ‘defection’ would be fired by a dire economic situation due to the financial crisis.

Significantly, Mandelson DID say that he was too ‘tribal’ to work as a minister in a Tory cabinet but he would not rule out serving his country by taking up a public office under a Tory government. Mandelson is not an uncontroversial figure and is often pictured as a king-maker within the Labour fold – it was Mandelson who switched his backing to Blair in the original Blair-Brown tussle and it is Mandelson who is touting rising Labour star Ed Miliband, but more of that later. What is interesting is the reaction to this potential ‘turncoat’ activity by a high profile Labour politician and strategist.

This stay in Epinal is proving to be more than pleasant and reinvigorating. We noticed upon arrival on Friday night that our last minute hotel was bang in the middle of a concentration of shopping zones – foremost among which (at least according to the better half) was the outlet selling all forms of the latest Desigual clothing. The male line of this particular designer leaves much to be desired but I must admit that the choice for the ladies is absolutely heavenly.

So we strolled from shop to shop and broke many and austere promise in the process. Epinal was in festive mode with its riversides bedecked in floral gaiety in celebration of sexy Saint Maurice. My girlfriend decided Maurice was sexy as she gazed upon a representation of the Latin saint in the Basilica at Epinal. The town is wonderfully tiny and can be visited in one day – the beautiful side is that every eatery seems to be a wonderful experience. Midday we opted for Breton food at La Cornouaille – sarrasin fillesakpancakes full of blood pudding, apples and walnuts for me and steak haché, gruyère and egg for the missus.

This evening, after the swim in the bubbly pool and sauna we treated ourselves to a sumptuous chinese meal complete with sake digestive spirit. The porcelain set in which the sake was served is sure to prompt some oohs and aahs from the clientele – the tiny shooter sized glass has a glass bubble bottom and so long as the glasses are full of the sake you can perceive an image at the bottom of the glass. Said image is of very naked women (for the lads) and very naked and endowed men (for the ladies). Being the gimmick lover than I am I was thrilled by this particular peculiarity and back at the hotel have started my search for a collector’s set of these porno glasses which seem to be traditional chinese fare.

No luck until now as all ebay auctions on the products in question have closed. Anyways, I am off to get a nice nap. Tomorrow it is the musée des images before heading back north to Luxembourg. Incidentally winter is officially with us here with temperatures hitting the sixes and sevens at night. Time to cozy up! Have a nice Sunday…

We finally got proof that Obama is infallible as the bid for hosting the 2016 Olympics was one by Lula’s Brasil. J’accuse is over the moon for this double-whammy celebrating one of the world’s greatest sporting nations. Anyways, I am going to take this weekend off. Luxembourg promises to be boring this weekend so I’m scooting off with my better half down to Epinal – cité d’images. I’ll be back Sunday evening. Look out for this week’s article in the Indy… it’s called “The Sultans of Swing” and there’s no prizes for guessing the topic. (No it’s not Dire Straits).

Have a nice Notte Bianca.

It’s amazing what time can do but it’s just great sitting back and watching the ripple effect of Labour’s latest appointment. J’accuse would like to point its readers to Marie Benoit’s hilarious article penned in the aftermath of the 2004 Labour “electoral” victory. The article is called “the unbearable heaviness of being Marisa” (22nd June 2004) and Benoit, who makes no attempt to hide her labourite leanings takes pleasure at driving huge digs in the direction of Marisa and her (at the time) Monday column on the Independent.

Marisa was then still working as Chairman of the Housing Authority. Click on READ MORE  and you will find a few juicy clips from Benoit’s tirades (my subtitles).

While David Casa was busy crafting mysterious articles about the European Union’s answers to the financial crisis, the big news in Malta was that ex-PN darling and ex-Housing Authority Chairman Marisa Micallef (ex-Leyson) had been appointed consultant/press-officer to Joseph “Decision-maker” Muscat to the tune of €40,000 euros. The news spread like wildfire after it broke and the first reaction we got from the PN sympathetic crowd had to come from a DCG back from her Chinese break. Daphne replied to a comment on her blog (Something else to bicker about) thusly:

Hi Daphne

What about marisa micallef leyson? What is your thought about the latest news?

[Daphne – I think that when a twice-divorced woman has a daughter to raise, she is sometimes forced to make uncomfortable decisions to pay the bills, decisions that she may not have made otherwise. Mrs Micallef Leyson asked the government to create certain jobs for her, after her search for permanent employment in Britain did not work out, but was told that this was not possible. She may have believed that she was owed allegiance in return for her own allegiance; she may have been wrong or right in this – I don’t know. It’s not how I see things, so I can’t understand that way of thinking. But I can see the reasoning behind it in a way. She may have found herself in a difficult position financially. Knowing what it’s like to pay the considerable bills that come with running a household and raising children, I must say I find it difficult to pass judgment. Thousands of otherwise decent women the world over resort to being paid for sexual services to pay the bills when they’re really on their uppers and have children to raise, and even then I find it hard to judge. EUR40,000 a year is a lot of money for a single mother to turn up her nose at, and we’re not all lucky enough to be able to earn our living using our own initiative.

To begin with it is hard to ignore the “I find it difficult to pass judgement” bit but, if you do, then you will find that in this quick riposte to the provocation by “no comment” (another cheap anonymous commentator), the not so subtle undertones are there: Marisa needed the cash so she rushed to whoever could cough it up. As if the implication of mercenary was not enough (in the week Mandelson was interviewed stating he would work for the Tories if need be), we have the second bait thrown speculatively: some women end up prostituting themselves in order to pay the bills. There you have it: financially despondent Marisa (who to boot does not fit into the “Happy Family” model) is a mercenary who responds to the same instincts as a woman driven to prostitution in dire circumstances.

Be honest. How many of you have googled David Casa’s article in today’s Independent? At the risk of becoming a right royal pain in the arse… we did. Interesting results really. Before we tell you what we found out it is important to remind readers why we are kicking up such a fuss. It’s not just the cut & paste business and lack of attribution of sources that are irritating.

There is of course a major problem in this business of unattributed snippeting but beyond that there lies the most major of issues: what do politicians like Casa think they are doing with this type of column. Regurgitating other people’s work is lame – but it also, as we have pointed out, smacks of lack of respect toward the reader. The authors of such articles are just sending in strings of words amounting to columns simply to occupy space on a paper as some form of unpaid advertisement. The effort to prepare the content is minimal – in all probability Casa does not even write his articles himself but asks some lackey within his entourage to do so. Said lackey is lazy. Very lazy.