Day 3448: The Return of the Great Awkward Bustard

Thursday:


Isn't great that Britain's biggest booby is back!

What with their awkward flapping not to mention dangerously flamboyant mating habits making them all too tempting a target, it was once thought to be all over for Britain's answer to Big Bird. His habit of crashing and burning, a consequence of flying blind into electrical cables, didn't help either.

But now, thanks to a programme of careful conservation, the bustard has been given a SECOND CHANCE!

And for those of you NOT interested in BIRDS, Mr Simon Hugs has been chosen as the new Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats.



Everyone loves Mr Hugs. Even if everyone also has their "Oh Simon!" moments.

He could be described as one of those MARMITE politicians – if only MARMITE had a habit of changing its flavor every five minutes so that at one bite you love it and the next makes you want to spit.

Just recently, the speech that he gave at the Special Conference to endorse the Coalition deal was widely judged a CROWNING MOMENT OF AWESOME™ and was deservedly given the biggest standing ovation of the day.

But just a couple of days earlier he had appeared on radio show Any Questions with Jonathan Dimbledonkey and totally fumbled the defense of the Coalition's fixed term parliament proposal by not being properly up on the brief – not just leaving an open goal, but actually moving the goal closer to the opposition and then tipping the ball over the goal line himself by suggesting that the 55% rule was to help the GOVERNMENT.

(As any fule kno: the 55% rule is to protect PARLIAMENT from GOVERNMENT; NOT the other way around. Parliament can get rid of the Government on a vote of 50%+1; Government can only get rid of Parliament on a vote of 55%+1. That's why it's actually TOO LOW, not TOO HIGH; Scotland has a more reasonable 66% protection. And if no one can form a government, then you get an election after 28 days ANYWAY. But you know all this.)

DOUBLE but, the day before THAT Mr Hugs had appeared on TV's Questionable Time with David Dimbledonkey, and speaking to an audience that started off apparently largely hostile to the Coalition won them over by calmly and sensibly explaining that grown up politics was what they had voted for and was what they were getting.


I think that I can understand WHY the Liberal Democrats in Parliament chose him to be their new Deputy. I think he is the biggest woolliest security blanket in the whole of toytown, and with when you want to feel BETTER about yourselves for getting into bed with the big bad wolf, what could be better than hugs from Mr Hugs.

Of course what the Parliamentary Party NEEDS is not the same thing as what it WANTS. If you're getting into bed with the big bad wolf you need the BRAVE WOODSMAN and not GRANDMA!

Being deputy leader should not be a CONSOLATION PRIZE or a merit badge for LONG SPEECHES SERVICE. Yes, you CAN use is as a handy soap box for a non-Government Liberal voice, but the irony is that Mr Hugs is so popular and well-known already that he doesn't really NEED another soap box to stand on.

With a lot of the best of Liberal talent is now IN government, we need to be developing our next generation. I think Mr Tim would have been an excellent and exciting choice, though my personal choice would have been Ms Jo Winsome, though she chose not to stand.

Because what the Deputy Leader should REALLY be doing is preparing the Party, in Parliament and out, for what happens AFTER the Coalition: they should be leading the independent policy development and developing the campaigns. That means it's a job for someone with drive and energy and organisation and new ideas. And Mr Hugs has lots of drive and energy.

So many congratulations to Mr Hugs and do try not to fly into any electric power lines!

.

Day 2474: Thursdays Are Funny

Thursday:


Especially when you add up the days in your diary and realise that Daddy has missed one out again.

(It was Thursday 30th August if you are interested.)

Note to self: must watch Darth Maul's new telly show one of these days.


Mr Hugs was on cracking form on Questionable Time, though – favourite moment was when he completely DERAILED Ms Harriet Harpy. Ms Harpy was going into one about how Mr Balloon said his Conservatories would be coming first in the Ealing by-election when Mr Hugs (from off camera) asked:

"Did they come second then?"

"No," shrills La Harpy, not spotting the ELEPHANT TRAP, "they did not even come second…"

"Who came second then?"

Ms Harpy, face now like thunder, "it was the…" snarls "…Liberal Democrats."

Huge applause. Well done Mr Hugs.

PS

I now have to face the terrifying possibility that Ms Harpy reads my diary!

Day 2231: Big Beasts

Thursday:


Former BERSERK SAFETY ELEPHANT, Mr Charles Clarke, has given a speech to the LSE saying it is time to start charging for the NHS.

Has he gone MAD?

Has he got BIRD FLU?

Or has he been HIT BY A CAR and sent BACK IN TIME to the EIGHTIES?!?!?!


At the other end of the Labour food chain, captain of the CREEPY-CRAWLY club, Mr David Millipede, was on Questionable Time last night, being badgered by Mr David Dimbledonkey.

Watching Mr Millipede talk down to the audience it was clear that he was trying to recapture some of the MAGIC of the young Lord Blairimort. Compassion. Concern. Conscription. That sort of thing. The slightly pained expression at the terrible suffering that the government is inflicting. If only there was something he could do. It might work too, if it weren't for the fact that Mr Millipede works for the man responsible!

The first question was all about the huge media attention given whenever that nice but hard done by Mr Dr Reid calls down a terrorist raid in order to get himself out of a tight spot in the headlines keep us all safe in our beds!

Why DOES it need the Home Secretary to arrive in person, surrounded by a dozen armed police people surrounded by two dozen photographers and journalists to hear him muttering:

"We've caught them, my precious, caught them we have. Live and plumptious, like juicy fisheses, my precious…"

Lots of people get arrested without the Home Secretary turning up to take the credit personally.


Liberal Democrat Mr Hugs was on the panel, and he pointed out that this sort of LARGING IT UP in the limelight does incredible damage to the relationship between the police and the public.

And, he said, of nearly a thousand arrests made under the government's Terror Laws, only a hundred and twenty-some have been charged and a mere twenty-five convicted. If there are so VERY, VERY FEW actual convictions, why make such a VERY, VERY BIG fuss about all the arrests? Surely it is not just to TERRIFY THE BEJEZUS out of everyone!

Slowly and patronisingly, oozing sincerity like snake oil, Mr Millipede explained that the reason the government was sending in huge armies of TERROR POLICE to tear up local communities was because the most important thing was to protect those communities on the ground.

"Get on the GROUND! Get on the GROUND!" as the terror police shout at any terrorist or bookshop worker they happen to apprehend.

"Squish them and squash them, my precious," the Home Secretary may choose to interject, should he be around for a photo-op.

Mr Millipede tried on the sorrowful look that Lord Blairimort used to use when he was going to say something particularly outrageous.

"Mr Hugs ought to think on the fact that we can't have liberty and security," said Mr Millipede like he didn't know this was a cliché in the time of Benjamin Franklin.

Fortunately Ms Salma Yaqoob was there to point out that this was total piffle. Security only comes through liberty, she said. Giving people freedom reinforces the ties of community that are the only real route to security.

"The more you tighten your grip, Governor Millipede, the more star systems will slip through your fingers!" added, er, Princess Leia.

Huge applause for Mr Hugs and Ms Yakult. Dead Silence for Mr Millipede. I'm sure it didn't used to be that way for Lord Blairimort.

Still it was SIGNIFICANT to see that Mr Millipede is clearly trying to turn on the CHARM. Perhaps there is some sort of LEADERSHIP CONTEST in the offing, who can tell? He has even allowed someone to persuade him to shave off that BUM-FLUFF beard his has been trying to grow for the last twelve months!


Mr Dimbledonkey, on the other hand, had a completely different tree to bark up. He was convinced that he had caught Mr Millipede in some nonsense "gaffe".

(Even though my chum, top Liberal Democrat party animal, Mr Councillor Stephen Tall, has got there first with this story, I DID write my diary BEFORE seeing that!)

The question was whether it wasn't long past time that Lord Blairimort had been put in prison out to pasture. Mr Millipede was saying that a lot of the stick that Lord Blairimort gets is only because he is the man in charge, and a lot of people will feel the same way about Mr Frown for no better or worse reason than he has taken over.

"People will be saying 'wouldn't it be great to have that Blairimort back because we can't stand that Gordon Frown'."

"Ah ha!" says Mr Donkey, "so you think Mr Frown is as bad as Lord Blairimort!"

This is just a game of trying to trip up the politician. It is playing with the words he used to try and get some other meaning out. And it is the sort of thing that makes parties turn their politicians into ROBOTS.

Journalists are the FIRST to complain that our politicians are all the same, bland and boring, and that there are no CHARACTERS any more. Well if you journalists are going to jump up and down on the heads of anyone who express themselves in poetic or colourful or just FUN language then WHAT DO YOU THINK IS GOING TO HAPPEN?

It is QUITE CLEAR that Mr Millipede meant that Lord Blairimort gets a lot of flak JUST for being PM and the same would apply to anyone.

OBVIOUSLY that means that MR Millipede is DELUSIONAL.

But the point to put to him is that lots of people have COMPLETELY LEGITIMATE reasons to think that Lord Blairimort is a liar and a criminal and not fit to serve COFFEE in the House of Commons.

You should challenge Mr Millipede on his BLANDISHMENTS; his sweeping ASSERTIONS that seek to excuse any faults of the PM; and his apparent preference to blame the ELECTORATE for Lord B turning out to be as trustworthy as Jeffrey Archer, as honest as Jonathan Aitken and as incorruptible as Neil Hamilton. All in one.

But don't try and imply he was making some coded criticism of Mr Frown.


Just as BOGUS was the whole idea of privatising the NHS, which was the kite that the retired safety elephant was flying on the Newsnight show.

Could it be that he really thought it was a good idea to start letting people going into hospital pay to be upgraded to FIRST CLASS?

My fluffy brain is not very good at thinking about these WEIGHTY ISSUES. So I have concentrated very hard to think about a simple example.

Some people have suggested using money as a way to discourage FRIVOLOUS use of the NHS's limited resources. The idea is to get people to pay a deposit, say a tenner, if they want to make a doctor's appointment. Your GP can refund you your money when you attend.

It MIGHT stop some people skipping appointments, I suppose. But it also seems that it would need a lot of stuff to make it work – how can you get a deposit over the phone from a person without a debit or credit card? You can't go having doctors handing out tenners, that would be a risk to them, not to mention silly. Not to mention the way that people often don't so much MISS their appointments but – what with being sick AND having to cope with public transport – arrive five minutes late and are told that they've lost their place.

Of course if you just CHARGE people a tenner, that's a lot easier… except of course it is BASICALLY a tax on being ILL. A bit like those eye and dental check up charges that we want to abolish.

Mr Clarke had a wheeze about getting the money off of people's insurance. So that would be people who've paid their tax for the NHS already AND paid their insurance too then get an insurance hit so their premiums go up AGAIN – that's pretty much triple taxing the people who are being GOOD and insuring themselves. Nice plan, fatty.

Had the safety elephant thought all this through?

No of course not: this was an exercise in creating HEADLINES not policies, and – ooh look – mission accomplished!

"Clarke backs NHS charging" wails the Grauniad.

"Let's charge for NHS and schools" trumpets the Hellograph.

Just like Mr Steven "Pants on" Byers last August floating the idea of abolishing Inheritance Tax, all this unspeakable in pursuit of the unthinkable is about putting Lord Blairimort on the front page and putting Mr Balloon in a real BIND.

Deftly, Mr Clarke slipped his size-twelve stiletto in:

"The Labour are willing to consider all the options to keep Britain's services working. The Conservatories don't have any policies at all."

This is Lord Blairimort's defence against TRIANGULATION. What is Mr Balloon supposed to do? If he comes up with a nice, tame, safe, non-barking health policy – okay, BIG if, if he comes up with a policy – but if he does, people will say: but why are you being LESS RADICAL than this person in the Labour? And if he comes up with something to the right of the safety elephant, well he's a nutty nut-nut Conservatory again, right?

From Lord Blairimort's point of view it is WIN-WIN. The media cannot attack HIM for being bonkers-in-the-nut. Yet he has succeeded in outflanking Mr Balloon on BOTH FLANKS. SIMULTANEOUSLY.

Cunning, eh.


What does Mr Clarke get out of engineering this apparent train wreck? It is CRASH for PEERAGES?

Or does he believe that Lord Blairimort can use his MAGIC SPIN to conjure up the 41 signatures it would need for the safety elephant to challenge Mr Frown for the leadership?

"Look, Charles… you make yourself look an idiot do me a favour and… you know… I'll allow you to make yourself look an idiot do me another favour… how does that sound?"

"Will there be pies?"

"Well, uh huh, of course."

"Count me in, Lord B!"

BEASTLY, isn't it.