Friday, May 23, 2014

Compare and contrast.

"Prince Charles compares Putin to Hitler" say the newspaper headlines.  Two points - firstly this was not a public pronouncement by the Prince, it was a private conversation with a member of the public which happened to be overheard by a nearby journalist, and the question arises as to whether in those circumstances it should ever have been reported - but I'm afraid journalistic ethics have long since gone the way of all flesh.  Secondly, the comparison between Hitler's annexation of Austria and the Sudetenland and Putin's annexation of the Crimea and moves towards areas of Eastern Ukraine are obvious - this does not, as the newspapers would have it, compare Putin to Hitler, but more compares what Putin is doing to what Hitler did - a very different thing.  But then, as I've said before, the mantra is - don't let the facts get in the way of a good headline.

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