Mickey I. and the drug of ambition

What does the deputy Liberal leader really think of the Taliban's "radiant tomorrow"? The quote below reminds one of the good old days when he actually could be called a "philosopher". Today he is a partisan joke. I have seen a very good mind of my generation corrupted thoroughly (unless he publicly disagrees with his leader, M. Dion):

On British television's The Late Show in October 1994, the philosopher Michael Ignatieff asked Howbshawm [the Grauniad strikes again in the first sentence at the link - MC]: 'In 1934, millions of people were dying in the Soviet experiment. If you had known that, would it have made a difference to you at the time?' Hobshawm replied: 'I don't actually know that it has any bearing on the history I have written. If I were to give you a retrospective answer which is not the answer of an historian, I would have said "Probably not".' Ignatieff then pressed him further, asking: 'What that comes down to is saying that had the radiant tomorrow actually been created, the loss of fifteen, twenty million people might have been justified?' Hobshawm immediately answered: 'Yes.' Later Hobshawm received the much-coveted Companionship of Honour for the Labour Government.

Of course fifteen or twenty million people weren't 'lost' by Stalin; they were shot, frozen, starved and worked to death. And there were probably more than twenty million of them in total...

That's from pp. 217-218 of Andrew Roberts' A History of the English-Speaking Peoples since 1900. The book itself really is a not very good pastiche without any satire. Mr Roberts also clearly knows little of, nor has little interest in, Canada. Australia is another matter.

Mickey I.'s great-grandfather was a foil for Harry Flashman--a man who never had any moral pretentions but at least had survival, and fun, smarts. About which read Quartered Safe Out Here by George MacDonald Fraser.

The Ignatieffs ain't what they used to be. Nor are most of us living within Western civilization, culture, catchment area, whatever...

Mark C.

Posted by markc at January 7, 2008 09:24 AM