I’ve had an emailed reply from the efficient, and no doubt quite busy, CBI press office to my query asking for confirmation that Director General Digby Jones had said what the Evening Standard quoted. In my query I asked for the text of Digby Jones’s speech. Here’s the reply:
There is no speech this came from an interview with the Evening Standard – Digby Jones is speaking today though, at 12.30
The speech and press release will be on the website later.
And it is, but it's about the EU.
Last week it seems that Republicans managed to purloin a Democratic memo relating to the Senate Intelligence committee — either from a computer or a trash can. At the same time, someone was stealing Democratic memos relating to the Senate Judiciary committee: Apparent Theft Of Democratic Memos Probed (washingtonpost.com).
Republican hacker at large?
Brad DeLong expresses doubt as to whether (as I noted earlier that the Evening Standard had reported) even the Bush administration could be quite dumb enough to be strong-arming US defense firms in hopes of getting them to close up shop abroad and bring jobs to the US:
I do not believe this. I cannot believe this. Incompetent, short-sighted, ungrateful, and mendacious as we all know the George W. Bush administration to be, even they wouldn't do something as stupid and counterproductive as this.
Would they?
I understand Brad's reluctance. Like him, I don't want to think that our leaders can be that dumb. And the Evening Standard is not the gold standard for reporting.
Trouble is, it's not that easy to figure out exactly whether the Director-General of the Confederation of British Industry Mr. Digby Jones actually said what was reported in the Evening Standard. The text of the speech doesn't seem to be online. I've e-mailed the Confederation of British Industry in the hopes they will send it to me.
In the mean time, we have to make do with the newspapers. The usually reliable Financial Times more or less echoes the Evening Standard. A Scottish paper suggests this isn't about private strong-arming so much as the “Buy America” campaign. And the Daily Telegraph says that the pressure came from Congresspeople — some of whom unquestionably are this stupid — and not from the White House. And, indeed, if you look at what the FT and ES actually say, they don't finger the Bush administration as such — just give the strong impression the Administration is the source of the pressure from the context, which is about Bush's visit.
But even if the pressure came from Bush's allies in Congress, instead of directly from the administration, this isn't good.
Jotwell
