The World

Two of my former colleagues at The Economist have just started blogs. It is quite funny to see The Economist struggling to reconcile this most personal of mediums (egocentric, if you are being uncharitable) with the magazine’s obsession with maintaining the anonymity of its journalists.

Why, I am sometimes asked – is The Economist still anonymous? I think there are three possible reasons. First, it keeps the place more collegiate. Second, it allows the paper rather than the journalists to keep all the “brand value”- and this is a bargain,the journalists are increasingly happy to accept, in return for a regular salary and a warm place to sit, neither of which can be taken for granted elsewhere in the media. Finally, there is the “if it ain’t broke” principle – The Economist has been a huge success story over the past thirty years, so why change?

Still, now that I have left the place, I feel no compunction to respect their silly rules on anonymity. So whilst directing your attention to the new blogs by Charlemagne and Bagehot, I would also like to take the opportunity to blow their covers. Charlemagne’s name is David Rennie. I’ll say that again: DAVID RENNIE. Bagehot’s name is ANDREW MILLER.

Both of their new blogs are disturbingly good and prolific. My feeling that Charlemagne is on the right lines, was admittedly boosted by the fact that he appeared to like my most recent column on Europe. But the rest of his post is devoted to a hilarious evisceration of the euro-views of Simon Heffer of the Daily Telegraph. I was also glad to see that he shares my low opinion of the European Parliament. Describing it as a “student union with better expenses” is about right

Bagehot has also got off to a fast and fluent start. (With luck, he won’t be able to keep it up.)

Reading both of these new Economist blogs, I was struck that they were both hitting a similar theme. Bagehot-Miller was bemused that the British press was so determined to portray Gordon Brown’s trip to Washington as a disaster, whatever the facts. Charlemagne-Rennie was surprised that the British press was determined to write up the most recent European summit as a disaster, whatever the facts.

So what conclusion can we reach? Perhaps that the British media are a bunch of naysaying whingers, who know that a good disaster is always better copy than a boring success story.