Thursday 3rd October 2019

[HindleA]

I'll see what I can do but I may implement a tariff.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

QT report ? Please

Now that I've found out what that weird noise was I'll get to work straight away.

(it was the carbon monoxide alarm, warning me of a low battery thankfully and not imminent death).

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Question Time tonight came from Wallasey which I suspect is somewhere near Liverpool unless the audience were putting on comedy accents for a laugh.

For the Tories we had Nadhim Zahawi. Poor old Nadhim is their go to guy whenever utter bullshit needs defending. Which is why we see him a lot. And tonight he had a thankless task. Nobody, and I mean nobody, not on the panel, not in the audience, were fooled by this nonsense deal proposed by Johnson. This came as a heartening surprise to me so no doubt Nadhim was in a state of utter shock that the efforts by the right wing press and BBC to paint it as somehow credible seemed to have come to naught. And yet he ploughed on regardless explaining at length the minutiae of an offer that quite evidently no other human in a quite large volume of space around him took seriously. I can only assume he volunteers for this kind of thing for sexual reasons.

For Labour we had Sarah Jones who I thought was rather good. Had a kind of teacher you liked at school thing about her. She'd worked with Mo Mowlam so knew her stuff on the Good Friday Agreement and refused to be cowed when Fiona Bruce once again (this is a weekly thing) invited the audience to laugh at Labour's brexit policy. Rather than appear embarrassed she pointed out it required a bit of thought and stood her ground. As far as shadow ministers go she's the best I've seen in quite a while.

For the civilised world we had Bonnie Greer. I've seen Bonnie on Question Time before when she's seemed a bit half hearted but tonight she was on proper arse kicking form. She repeatedly pointed out the patronising attitude the British government and press have towards Ireland. Which led her to point out how 'Irish' the United States is and the consequences that would have for any trade deal if Britain pisses Ireland off. And successfully took on a member of the audience who questioned her claim that foreigners were being made to feel unwelcome in Britain. She was, in short. cool as fuck.

For an unbiased academic view we had Professor of European politics Anand Menon who did exactly what he was supposed to do, and was curiously the only member of the panel who gave any credence that Johnson's offer of a deal may have been serious. Not because he thought the EU stood any chance of accepting it, but because Johnson's political position was so precarious that he might out of desperation have meant it.

And finally we come to Mad Melanie Phillips. She said Johnson's deal offer was bollocks. She said it was all a sham in order to blame the EU. She agreed that it fucked up the Good Friday Agreement. But then Mel's a bit of a Faragist. Like all good ex-communists.