Doing time
Taki
The telephone rang rather early, and when I picked it up an English male voice said, ‘Hello, Taki, this is David Irving ... ’ He was ringing from the Vienna pokey, just after his conviction, and we had a brief chat. Having been in such a position myself, but only for four months, instead of three years, I knew what not to say. Things like ‘It’ll be over in a jiffy’ only add to a prisoner’s despair. That old Oscar chestnut about each day being like a year, a year whose days are long, is what doing bird is all about. David Irving may be a foolish man but he’s also a very proud one. He did not give the impression of feeling sorry for himself. His only concern was about his 12-year-old daughter and her mother, now both in desperate straits.
The irony is that now that he’s been jailed, lots of people are rushing to defend him. Using the de rigueur adjectives such as odious, detestable, repugnant, repulsive and indefensible, they nevertheless endorse freedom of speech, as well they should. I thought the historian Michael Burleigh, author of The Third Reich, got it just about right in the Telegraph when he wrote that, in the course of 30 years, ‘Mr Irving has gone from being a respected, if sensationalist, military historian of the second world war to being the sinister Popeof-Holocaust-denialism.’ I liked Burleigh’s compassion. He pointed out how Janner, while gloating over Irving’s fate, seemed unaware of what our society will look like once we start jailing those who say things we don’t like to hear or agree with. I also liked Deborah Lipstadt’s announcement that she was uncomfortable with the decision to jail her opponent. As Michael Burleigh wrote, it’s taboo even to broach the fact that, in the 20th century, commu nism happened to kill many times more people than Nazism.
Irving, as far as I know, has sought to define the scope of the Holocaust, not to deny it. I have never heard him utter an anti-Semitic word, but then I’m an unreliable witness because I do not live in the Orwellian world in which any deviation from the received and authorised version of events as it relates to the second world war is unacceptable and a criminal offence.
But enough of this depressing subject. Happiness was watching gallant little Finland whip big bully Uncle Sam in Olympic hockey. I rarely root against America because so many America-haters do. These Olympics, however, brought out the hater in me. First of all the ludicrous new sports expressly created for Americans watching TV, such as aerial freestyle skiing and snowboard cross. Watching a bunch of juvenile delinquents twist their bodies in the air is not a sport, it’s the equivalent of playing Harry Houdini high on coke. Why not real sports, like climbing a mountain on seal skins and then racing down, something people have been doing since the turn of the last century?
Incidentally, the Finns concentrated on precise passing and shooting, the Yanks on cross-checking and being physical. Well, they went home empty-handed, just like that blowhard Bode Miller, who got zilch in five events after he denigrated the Olympic alpine events. The Austrians showed how it should be done, as did the rest of the European racers, all brave men and women. Miller should join a winter circus, as should the rest of the snowboard crossers. The NHL, the professional hockey league in America, should take a seat and take a lesson. The Finns, Swedes, Russians and Czechs play hockey the way it should be played. The Americans and Canadians play a little hockey in between fights. That is the whole difference.
And there was more good news. Barcelona beat Chelsea, but, more important, it did so with class and style, two things totally alien to anyone connected with the Stamford Bridge crowd. Chelsea plays ugly. The excuses of the coach are even uglier. The club reminds me of these people Tony Blair has stuffed into the House of Lords. They may have a handle to their name, but noble they ain’t. And speaking of the ignoble, I ran into Marc Rich in the communal garage I share with a next-door chalet. He was with two heavies, but I lost it anyway. ‘You belong in jail, not in my garage,’ I snarled at him. The pardoned fugitive was taken aback. I repeated it, and told his minders to get lost while they were at it.
The next day, while watching John-Taki race in the Rosey old boys downhill, I was told that the ex-fugitive was lunching at the Eagle Club. That did it. If anyone accused of stealing 50 million big ones reads this, ring me, and I’ll give you a good lunch at the Eagle.
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