Dan O'Neill and The Cardiff Eisteddfod

Tonight I tried to heed the lesson highlighted in one of my favourite episodes of The West Wing. One of the characters, Josh Lyman, foolishly responded to a published article designed to incurr a response.

He paid a heavy price for forgetting the no response rule.

Dan O'Neill's article in the South Wales Echo discussing so called 'language fascists' was way over the top. He meant to offend and duly did so. Welsh speakers, like everyone else, don't like being discussed in the same breath as any form of fascists.

Some two years ago, Trevor Phillips was asked by a black activist at a meeting in Cardiff why he did not condemn people for being 'racists' or 'fascists'. He said that such words should only be used when they are appropriate otherwise they lose their meaning when they are appropriate.

He was right - enough said.