Grapeviney

And such a classy user of the ball. That snap around the corner from the boundary to hit Hoges in the goalsquare was sublime.

Ripper headline out of the UK earlier this week about possible trade retaliation against US tariffs: "We'll put a levy on your Chevy and tax your whiskey and rye."

Trump a genius? Bwahahahha!! The Wall Street Journal - hardly a lefty newspaper - described his tweets on trade yesterday as ‘one of the greatest displays of economic nonsense in presidential history.’

The quarter-by-quarter scores from all 12 premierships, pictures of the 10 greatest MFC marks and goals, and the names of every player who played more than 100 games for the club, along with their signatures. Usual logo stuff.

W0o0-h0o0 !! Great comeback away from home after another sleepy, sloppy start. Spurs will need to be on guard against Juve doing the classic Italian 1-0 smash-and-grab job in the return fixture, but as you say, the away goals puts them in the box seat. With the league titles wrapped up in all the 5 major Euro leagues except Italy and maybe Spain, the remaining CL matches this round and beyond are all the more enticing, and I'll definitely be tuning into to RM v PSG tomorrow morning. Also interesting to read today that there's been a slump in broadcast revenue in EPL rights in the UK, following years of massive increases. Didn't realise that British broadcasters are only allowed to show 200 of the 380 games live, a restriction apparently aimed at maintaining high attendances at the grounds.

Spurs should have had a bagful, Macca, they botched plenty of gimmes, but Arsenal never looked threatening. In fact, they looked disinterested most of the time. Champions League returns this week, with plenty of good fixtures as highlighted in one of your earlier posts. I’m quietly confident about Spurs’ trip to Turin.

Jimmy? No-one called him that. Pretty sure it was Jimbo, or if not that, Cooky.

I haven't read the Wolff book, nut, but I came to exactly the same conclusion you did about sources / facts / quotes / opinion from reading the extract at the time of its release. There is a real art to that style of 'reportage' (if you could call it that) - creating something out of nothing and making it seem solid - but it leaves the door wide open for criticism about accuracy and truth, and also leads to questions about motive and bias. Also agree about the Broome book - a pretty good historical account.

Fascinating read here about Israel's attempts over the years to assassinate Yasir Arafat, an extract from a forthcoming book about the history of Israeli intelligence agencies and their targeted killings. What stands out is the moral tussle between senior military / intelligence / government figures, and the lengths to which some of them were prepared to go to, to get rid of the PLO leader, and how they were thwarted by others who thought the collateral damage (such as shooting down a commercial plane) was too high a price to pay. Really looking forward to the book as the article reads like a thriller and seems to be meticulously researched, with multiple sources giving their perspective on how each event unfolded.

I was kind of lucky, Macca - not only did they get one of their largest crowds for the season, but they were on song, too. Rooney actually put Everton ahead about 10mins in but was ruled off-side. From then on it was all Spurs and they could have finished with 6. The Barcelona game was much less of a spectacle, and while it was good to see Messi score, they never had to get out of 1st gear. I should add, the tour of the Camp Nou and the Barca museum is superb. You can go into the visiting team's rooms, walk down the race (which has an adjoining chapel!), sit on the bench and visit the press box. The trophy cabinet, obviously, is enormous, stretching the entire length of a large room. One of the best exhibits was a huge glass case with dozens (maybe hundreds) of little squares, each labelled with a highlight from Barca's history; you touch the square you want to see and it brings up a larger box that shows that particular goal, or game etc. I caught the first half of the match at Anfield, but had to leave for the airport at half-time unfortunately so missed the exciting finish. City's loss leaves the door just slightly ajar for United, but for the rest it'll be a battle for CL spots. Hammers have really turned the corner since Moyes took over, a mid-season revival along with Palace and the Cherries. It's been an interesting season in every respect except for the actual title race itself.

Some shots from the Barcelona v Levante game. The official attendance was listed as 56,000 but I reckon they fudged it, just as they do with crowds here, as the stadium seemed to be less than half full. Had amazing seats, sitting at about half-forward on level 2, which gave a great vantage point for the action. In the second half, the top row of seats in the stand opposite me took on this ethereal glow from the setting sun, and my cousin, who was sitting in the stand opposite, snapped the magnificent final shot in the series below. Seats at the Spurs - Everton game were also sensational, albeit this time at ground level, and I was within spitting distance of the Everton bench. Great atmosphere where I was (there were hundreds of Koreans sitting near me going crazy for Son, who was on fire) but not as good for viewing the match as the upper levels, where you get a better idea of space and distance etc. The thing which really struck me was how congested much of the play is, in comparison to what you see on TV, where it seems they have oodles of time and space to move the ball around. At both games I was one of the first in the ground so I could just sit there and soak up the enormity of it all!

Had to settle for a brace, but it’s hard to complain about a 4-0 thumping in front of more than 76,000. Was an unforgettable night, my seat was so good I was basically sitting on the bench, and could hear Poch and Sam Allardyce yelling out instructions. Spurs fans lament the lack of atmosphere at Wembley compared to the Lane, but coming from the much larger ‘G, it seemed intimate and the vibe all night was amazing. With Barca winning 3-0 last weekend, the whole trip has been a dream come true and I’m glad I came. Will post some pics when I get back to Oz. ⚽️⚽️⚽️

This really needs to be fleshed out a little more. Where is the appeal to 'families'... I mean 'hard-working families'... I mean 'hard-working Victorian families.'.. or perhaps 'hard-working Victorian mums and dads'? "As we go forward, we want hard-working Victorian families to join us on our journey as we strive to realise our core values of being a successful and sustainable club into the future." Or you could scrap all that and just borrow from Julia Gillard: "We are us!"

I’m going - and soon! Just bought premium seats at the Camp Nou for Barca v Levante on the 7th, and the same for Spurs v the Toffees 6 days later at Wembley, with a pre-game function, drinks etc. Pretty pumped, as I’ve dreamt about these stadia since I was a kid (albeit Wembley’s been totally refurbed since then, much like the ‘G). Hopefully Harry Kane can keep scoring hat-tricks for a few more weeks yet..

Or he might find a photographer to take a beautiful picture of the reef in all its colour and glory and then use that in an emotive campaign to claim climate change isn't impacting the reef at all, and then The Age could write a story on it, admitting in the story that the picture doesn't prove anything at all about climate change but hey, what the heck, it's a powerful image so let's run with it anyway. Because that's what the polar bear story is - propaganda masquerading as news. In days gone by, newspapers like the Age were on guard against PR stunts like this; now, they just print them, conceding in the article itself that it's a con. Pardon the pun, but the story does not bear out the headline. I understand the role that evocative and emotive symbols and imagery plays in getting a message across, highlighting an issue etc, but if it's not grounded in fact, then what's the point? It just ends up being ammunition for the other side, and gives credence to the whole phenomenon of 'fake news', undermining real stories and the public's trust in reputable media outlets and information.

The only one that comes close appeared in the Sun abut 20 years ago, when lowly Caledonian Thistle thrashed Celtic 3-1 in the Scottish Cup.

No, let's not pretend that this is some sort of contested issue. You can believe whatever you choose, I'll stick with history and fact.

You quoted him for a reason. If you disagree with it, then say so. And no-one on here said that 'all' Germans were implicated; it was you who asserted that the German military wasn't 'by and large' involved in the killing of Jews, even though they killed so often that it became routine and banal. It's OK, because there were good blacks and bad blacks, and good Asians and bad Asians, and good Arabs and bad Arabs...

It is black and white. The Nazis tried to wipe the Jewish people off the face of earth, no ifs, buts or maybes. It's instructive that on the previous page you post swathes of internet links about British genocides without any kind of critical analysis of the material, but the Holocaust is somehow 'not as black and white' as we're led to believe. Wow. Just wow. Don't think I've ever heard anyone victim-blaming the Holocaust before. Hopefully the 6 million Jews who perished were the 'bad Jews'.

Let me get this straight. They killed so much that it became routine and banal, but by and large they weren't involved in killing Jews? Interesting theory. Here's what the US Holocaust Memorial says about German military complicity, and here's an account from Yad Vashem (the Israeli equivalent). Members of the German military murdered or were complicit in the murder of Jews as well as people with disabilities, Roma (Gypsies), Soviet prisoners of war, and eastern European civilians. The German military knowingly supported the Einsatzgruppen, which worked in the rear of the German lines in the east as mobile killing units. Long after the war, a myth persisted claiming the German military (or Wehrmacht) was not involved in the Holocaust and other crimes associated with Nazi genocidal policy. This belief is untrue. The German military participated in many aspects of the Holocaust: in supporting Hitler, in the use of forced labor, and in the mass murder of Jews and other groups targeted by the Nazis. The military’s complicity extended not only to the generals and upper leadership but also to the rank and file. --------------------------------- The Wehrmacht was quite "nazified" by 1938, after Hitler gained the respect and fear of the armed forces by taking over territories, such as Austria and parts of Czechoslovakia, without having to resort to war. In addition, by that time, many young soldiers had joined the armed forces straight out of the Hitler Youth movement (Hitlerjugend) and the Reich Labor services. Some officers may have disapproved of the atrocities carried out by the Nazis when Germany invaded Poland in September 1939; however, they kept quiet after Germany vanquished FRANCE in May and June 1940 in a striking display of military strength and might. Members of the Wehrmacht stood by as Einsatzgruppen units attached to the army carried out the mass murder of Jews. Some Wehrmacht units even gave the Einsatzgruppen military support. A very few Wehrmacht officers objected to the extermination of Europe's Jews.

As the old saying goes, 'if you're not a liberal in your 20's you have no heart, if you're not a conservative in your 30's you have no head'. Prager will be pleased to know that the remarkable capacity of ultra-orthodox families to rapidly procreate is changing the demographics of America's Jewish population, and its politics.

It's true that most Jews aren't observant but I don't see how it's relevant to this discussion. The large majority, both practising and not, are extremely hawkish on Islam, immigration and all related issues. And while many Australian Jews are socially progressive, they're politically conservative. The state MP who represents Caulfield / St Kilda is a Lib and has been forever and a day, and if the Coalition put up a half-decent Jewish candidate who was strong on Israel, the same people would be more than happy to turf Michael Danby from the equivalent federal seat and install a Lib. All other 'Jewish electorates' are and always have been conservative strongholds (Kooyong, Goldstein, Wentworth et al). The bottom line is that most Australian Jews don't trust Labor on Israel (or the economy, foreign policy, and border protection), probably in that order. It's even more pronounced in the UK, where British Jews are talking about leaving England rather than staying under a possible Corbyn Labor Government. Ha! thanks for the vote of confidence, but I'm too much of a pragmatist to be an ideologue.

Not quite sure what you're getting at here Pro. How many Jews do you know - practising or non-practising - who are ignorant of Islamism and it's existential threat to Israel and Jewish people generally? We're no.1 on the hit list, before the rest of the infidels. There's a vocal 'left' minority in Israel, but world Jewry is extremely conservative (read right wing) on these issues, and Australian Jews particularly so.

You are right nut. Having said that, I find the decision by Trump to retweet anti-muslim videos posted online by the far-right Britain First party very worrying. Even the mob at InfoWars described it as 'bad optics'. We've gone from targeting the legitimate threat of Islamic extremism to open season on anyone with a middle eastern appearance. Here's Trump acolyte Ann Coulter: Confronted with the suggestion that she was spreading "fake news" by claiming one of the films showed a "migrant" beating up a Dutch man, when in fact both people pictured were citizens of the Netherlands. Coulter said: "Nobody cares about `migrant' against 'child of migrant'. He is not a 10th-generation Dutchman, he is beating up a 10th-generation Dutchman." She added: "Anybody can look at this video and see it is a Middle Easterner. If you would prefer, we'll say 'Middle Easterners born in the Netherlands.' but if you don't accept that, we're going straight back to `Middle Eastern' in another 30 seconds. It could not be more supremely irrelevant - it is a difference without a distinction. "The issue is all these Middle Easterners and Muslims being brought in. To pretend there's no difference between a 10th-generation Dutch person and a migrant or the child of a migrant is preposterous." As the grandson of Holocaust survivors, this language is downright frightening. The references to 10th generation Dutchmen suggest notions of racial purity, while the line about 'anybody can see it is a middle easterner' is beyond belief. Forget wearing yellow stars (or similar) to denote ethnicity / race / religion / origin - anyone who looks middle eastern is fair game. I know I definitely don't look like a 4th-generation Australian, I look much more middle eastern. Will I be spared when I inform the marauding hordes that I'm Jewish and not Muslim?

The Dortmund-Schalke game was a belter. Dortmund was 4-0 up within 25 minutes, only for Schalke to peg them back in the last 25 minutes and level the scores deep in injury time. Spurs again stumbled at home to weak opposition, while the draw at Anfield just helps City.