As we all turn over to BBC4 to watch Tom Mangold's 1979 documentary on Jeremy Thorpe, here is Peter Cook's parody of the judge's summing up at his trial. Maybe it is because I was still a teenager then, but this feels dangerous in a way that no television satire does today.
Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 518th weekly round-up from the Lib Dem blogosphere ... Featuring the five most popular stories beyond Lib Dem Voice according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (27 May – 2 June, 2018), together with a hand-picked seven from the last two weeks, following our break for last week's Bank Holiday, that you might otherwise have missed. Don't forget: you can sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox — just click here — ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging. As ever, let's start with ...
Sun 3rd
20:06
Layla Moran talks about her bariatric surgery on Any Questions and calls for focus on wellbeing in s...
Layla was brilliant on Any Questions on Friday night. You can listen to the whole thing here. The bit I especially appreciated was when she spoke very frankly about her own experience when answering a question about obesity. 11 year old Olivia Metcalfe asked: Given the the amount of media coverage relating to childhood obesity has had little or no effect on the problem, what would be the panel's favourite option – taxation, legislation or education and why? Layla said that as a former teacher, she'd be very proud of any of her students who came up with a question ...
Shardlow is a fascinating place - an inland port built where the Trent and Mersey Canal met the River Trent. Goods were transshipped from river to canal and canal to river. The village was filled with warehouses and canal arms and basins. Its only equivalent in Britain is Stourport-on-Severn in Worcestershire. Today, most of the arms and basins have long since been filled in, but many warehouses remains. Some have found new business uses, some have been converted into housing, some are derelict. I was there yesterday. Despite the fact that I must have visited it on a canal holiday ...
Disability News Service has the story on its web site – see link above The article does indeed make utterly shocking reading if the facts are as outlined. If they are then Government, the Dept. for Transport and the rail operating companies involved need to explain themselves. Those with disabilities should be our first thought not our last.
Everyone is worrying over the dog who got shot and she's very much alive and living the life of luxury in my parents house😂😂 #AVeryEnglishScandal pic.twitter.com/e3SLGHhEjG— amelia🌸 (@Am_Eliaaa) May 27, 2018Turns out this is not Rinka but the dog who played her in A Very English Scandal. ("What's my motivation, darling?") I am reminded of when Inky, the police dog in Softly, Softly: Taskforce, was shot dead on screen in 1970. There were so many complaints that Inky had to appear on Blue Peter with Terence Rigby (who played his hander PC Snow) to show he was still alive. I ...
The slogan being held up by Nick Clegg in 2007 is rather ironic now...
A version of this post first appeared on the Radix website... No doubt it is a sign of age, but I find myself a good deal less critical of people who vote for so-called 'populists' than I ought to be. I put the word in inverted commas because what they actually mean is 'rabble-rousers', and I don't have time for them. As Thomas Frank explained in the Guardian last weekend, populism was originally a left-wing reform movement which swept the Midwest of the USA in the 1880s and 1890s (and incidentally gave us the Wizard of Oz). It may actually ...
It was over to Lewisham this morning for some campaigning to help the excellent Lucy Salek in the Lewisham East Parliamentary by-election
You can tell things must be getting really bad when even the Conservatives are concerned about the shortfall of affordable houses. Survation recently polled 121 senior Conservative councillors, on behalf of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation ahead of the government's publication of its social housing green paper, expected in the next few months. The poll found 71% were concerned that the £2bn Government set aside for affordable housing in the Autumn Budget will be insufficient to meet the needs of their constituents. So what solutions do we need? Alex Marsh, a housing policy expert, has set out some truly radical proposals ...
Second paragraph of third chapter: "We need to have a chat," Rosie said, in a no-nonsense voice. Interesting story about a 17-year-old released from prison after serving the sentence for murdering her best friend when they were 10. It's a good portrait of how people deal with awful things that they themselves did in the past, and of the destructive role of the media. I didn't quite believe that the protagonist would have been able to put the psychological damage caused by her mother behind her, but perhaps that was needed for a good story. A grim and thought-provoking YA ...
Sun 3rd
11:55Review: Turning Point: Unscripted Reflections by Steve Richards - The formation of the SDP
Thanks to my friend Neil for drawing this one to my attention. Steve Richards has done a series of reflections on the big turning points in our politics over the last 40 years, from the election of Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister to the 2017 election. The second in the series concerns the formation of the SDP, when 4 former Labour Cabinet ministers left Labour over that party's adoption of an anti European, pro nuclear disarmament platform along with internal reforms that gave more power to members and trade unions. Richards makes the important point that if you are going ...
This is a track from The Decemberists 2018 album I'll Be Your Girl. Evan Rytlewski describes it as setting "a dopey Jock Jams beat to a Kidz Bop cheer-along". That was very much my thought.
It isn't just the Guardian which is full of typos, The Times has its moments as well. I suppose it is easy to confuse former Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott for Clint Eastwood.
I suppose it is the job of civil servants to plan for the worse-case scenarios, so I would expect there to be a document tucked away in the vaults of Whitehall Place outlining a doomsday scenario if Brexit goes tits-up in which we all go to hell in a handcart. And indeed, as this exclusive in the Sunday Times reveals, such a document does exist. What is really frightening is not that such a scenario is being envisaged but that there are a substantial number of hardliners who actually want to go down the route of a no-deal Brexit irrespective ...
Sat, 15:06: The 1943 Retro Hugo for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form https://t.co/VRAIAV8L8a Sat, 16:05: The twist in the tale of my parents' malicious will https://t.co/SRFCQ43bsk A grim tale. Sat, 17:01: RT @ad_greenway: Let's remind ourselves how every major IT project failure goes: political imperative, undercooked policy, big budget, huge... Sun, 09:33: RT @jodiequotepic: ATTENTION: Jodie Whittaker's birthday on her Wikipedia page is WRONG. She was born on 17th June, and talks about it in t... Sun, 10:04: DUP boundary changes switch may swing next election https://t.co/dyigosrNUi A significant shift from the DUP. (I am quoted.) Sun, 10:45: RT @KeohaneDan: ...
Yesterday, the winner of the Ashdown Prize was announced. This competition was run by Your Liberal Britain with this aim: In the face of such daunting forces, we must find radical new solutions to protect the power of the citizen – over their own lives, over the decisions that affect them, over the world around them. This is the Liberalism of tomorrow – the Liberalism Britain so badly needs. To that end, the Ashdown Prize for Radical Thought will be awarded to the boldest new policy idea that best empowers the citizen in the Britain of today and tomorrow. Over ...
Possibly the greatest living male Shakespearean actor, Sir Ian McKellen has reinvented himself in his latter years, coming out (on the BBC) as homosexual at the age of 49, campaigning on LGBT rights issues and going into schools (sometimes adopting his Gandalf voice) to encourage children to be themselves yet enter into the world of [...]
North Devon Liberal Democrats have selected their new prospective parliamentary candidate to try and win the seat back at the next election, and the news is of particular cause of celebration for all of us on the Liberal Democrat Voice team Kirsten Johnson - a county councillor, professional musician from Oxfordshire and Thursday Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice - was chosen at a meeting of party members in Barnstaple yesterday. She will be moving into North Devon shortly to enable her to devote maximum time and effort to her campaign. Kirsten Johnson emerged from a field of eleven to become ...
Sun 3rd
08:50
Liverpool – Watch out if travelling from Lime Street Station, it's mostly closed for 8 weeks
A Virgin Trains Pendolino train at Liverpool Lime Street Station. www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-44331859 The BBC has the detail on its web site – see link above
Following a pair of hustings this weekend, Liberal Democrat members in North Deveon have selected Kirsten Johnson from a field of three female candidates to be the party's new Prospective Parliamentary Candidate (PPC). The seat was previously held by Nick Harvey from 1992-2015. He is now the party's Chief Executive. Thrilled, delighted and ecstatic that my friend @DrKirstenJ has been selected as North Devon's next Lib Dem PPC. The hard work has paid off but the real hard work starts now: turning North Devon gold again! pic.twitter.com/Y9SbAeeJlf — Sam Campling [IMG: 🔶] (@SamCampling) June 2, 2018
Yesterday, more-or-less unannounced, extended download versions of Michael Nesmith's first five post-Monkees solo albums were released. These albums — the three albums by Michael Nesmith and the First National Band (Magnetic South, Loose Salute, and Nevada Fighter), the Second National ... Continue reading →
I am beginning to think I should have been a detective - something along the lines of John Gregson's Commander George Gideon. Today's newspapers are full of the revelation that Andrew Newton, who shot Norman Scott's dog Rinka, may still be alive. That will not have been such a revelation to anyone who reads this blog. Last Sunday, after spending a very few minutes on Google, I posted what reads very like an account of a meeting with a healthy Andrew Newton from 2015. Perhaps Gwent police read it, because until today they believed he was dead. Their interest in ...
