FAQs

I’ve been told to take myself a bit more seriously, so the Baldie FAQs have been updated.

House ads

A decent picture is still worth quite a lot, even if you write your words really big.

Catalan/Irish struggle

Mitchel McLaughlin is coming to give succour to the Catalan separatists next week. Too bad the IRA issued its recent statement in Spanish and French but not in Catalan.

Gràcia fiestas and the monopoly on legitimate violence

What’s the difference between Spanish defence minister, José Bono, who believes it better for his soldiers to die than to kill, and appears to thoroughly enjoy the television shots of him looking stern when the coffins come home; and Barcelona’s leaders, who decline to give their police force the resources or institutional backing that would…

British national branding

I think Stephen Moss is wrong to suggest that the British have only recently become patriotic–I think they probably always were to a much greater degree than BBC programming suggested. Some kind of shift in perceptions of Britain has, however, taken place. Whereas the Union Jack used to associated with the European far right, now…

Loving and horning

Says Gabriel Laguna here. Re his essay: I wonder if the sense of godliness induced by romantic love is why an inability to accept the existence of a deity used (sorry, can’t think of a ref) to be identified with an incapacity to love truly.

Shortest blog ever?

I have a funny feeling that Juan isn’t going to take up the reins after the holiday.