State of the Nation - Radio 4

[ardcarp]

Howard Jacobson's talk today was, to me anyway, electrifying.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000czm3

Stick with it past the first few minutes where HJ gets pushed off a pavement. There are so many quotable phrases. His slant on Thatcher, Johnson, May and Corbin made me chuckle out loud.

I gather this is the first of a seies. Can he keep it up?

[Frances_iom]

Howard Jacobson's talk today was, to me anyway, electrifying.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000czm3

...

It is the type of program that ought to have been broadcast pre election or even earlier though I recall some of his Sunday Morning postings , post God-slot, followed similar thoughts. It is also the type of program that the Beeb appears to have been scared to broadcast in the past - maybe since their days appear to be numbered before the Tories remove the licence fee, they are letting rip at the ruination that certain policies had brought to much of the country outside the almighty wen of London

[vinteuil]

.

... yes, good stuff here.

It's a five-part series - but with five different writers.

.

[Serial_Apologist]

It is the type of program that ought to have been broadcast pre election or even earlier though I recall some of his Sunday Morning postings , post God-slot, followed similar thoughts. It is also the type of program that the Beeb appears to have been scared to broadcast in the past - maybe since their days appear to be numbered before the Tories remove the licence fee, they are letting rip at the ruination that certain policies had brought to much of the country outside the almighty wen of London

Funnily enough, I have coincidentally thought the same thing! Andrew Marr is hosting a series of 45-minute problem-solving suggestions programmes dealing with such things as technology fixes for global warming and solutions to housing problems, every Monday morning on Radio 4, following the 9 o'clock news. Another possible reason is that the BBC thought about it and concluded that such items might have unduly influenced the general election result - whereas, regardless of whether one agrees or disagrees with the opinions expressed, it is programmes and talks of this very kind that were so desperately lacking in the pre-election period!

[ardcarp]

Two phrases (which I'm dishing out from memory) are along the lines of:

- during Mrs May's sojourn at No 10 she ceded power to Tory members of low intellect and no morals

-how many great men [sic] would only have turned out half as great had not a schoolteacher given them a sizzling report

[DracoM]

Precisely, SA.

A little learning is indeed a dangerous thing, but NO learning a disaster.
Ignorance is not bliss when the future of a nation is at stake.
Role of BBC?

So much of what we knew before 2016 ref, and the 2019 elections was massaged and re-packaged through different political parties' soi-disant 'briefings'
We have been belittled, demeaned and dismissed as players on most serious stages.

Serves us right for being so trusting.

[MrGongGong]

This was a quite compelling listen and had me going "yes, yes, exactly"

I expect the BBC to put up some gonk with the intellectual ability of Bagpuss in order to maintain the "balance"

[Tony Halstead]

Howard Jacobson's talk today was, to me anyway, electrifying.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000czm3

Stick with it past the first few minutes where HJ gets pushed off a pavement. There are so many quotable phrases. His slant on Thatcher, Johnson, May and Corbin made me chuckle out loud.

I gather this is the first of a seies. Can he keep it up?

Oh dearie me... even if you LOATHE HM's current Leader of the Opposition it would be courteous to at least spell his surname correctly.

[Tony Halstead]

By the way, I hold no brief for Mr Corbyn; having been a member of the LP for several years I resigned from the party mainly because of his dithering over the B-word.

[Bryn]

By the way, I hold no brief for Mr Corbyn; having been a member of the LP for several years I resigned from the party mainly because of his dithering over the B-word.

Fine as he was as my MP when I lived in Finsbury Park, I decided against joining his party when a number of my friends with similar political outlooks did so when he became leader. It was not just his effective equivocation regarding the UK's membership of the European Union that determined my decision. It was mainly that the Labour Party as such remained for me but the left wing of a single bird of prey. To mix metaphors somewhat, one swallow was not going to make a summer. Of those who have so far thrown their hats into the ring to replace him as leader, not one appears to me to be anywhere near up to the role of licking his boots.[This written before I heard that Rebecca Long–Bailey had joined the affray.]

Re State of the Nation, I fear the series has peaked in its first programme and from here it is downhill.

[LMcD]

By the way, I hold no brief for Mr Corbyn; having been a member of the LP for several years I resigned from the party mainly because of his dithering over the B-word.

Some folk would probably argue that his approach to Br*x*t was 'nuanced'.

[ardcarp]

Oh dearie me... even if you LOATHE HM's current Leader of the Opposition it would be courteous to at least spell his surname correctly

Np loathing on my part. Just ignorance.

I expect the BBC to put up some gonk with the intellectual ability of Bagpuss in order to maintain the "balance"

It hasn't happened yet, judging by today's excellent speaker.

[ardcarp]

State of the Nation??? See my Erasmus thread on Platform 3.

http://www.for3.org/forums/showthread.php?21180-Goodbye-to-ERASMUS