L et us, briefly, return to the happy old game of
War Cant Bingo. Was ever there prose so replete with the guff-inflated set phrases of war cant as the Prime Minister's article in the Observer at the weekend: 'Why we must never abandon this historic struggle in Iraq'? Not content with a headline making clear that this is a 'historic struggle', the article announced that we are 'locked in a historic struggle' in sentence one, and affirmed later that even the antiCoalition insurgents 'know it is a historic struggle'. Two more 'struggles' in the text — leaving readers, the while, struggling with a veritable blizzard of those abstract nouns Orwell warned us about. 'Freedom' and 'tolerance' get two outings each; there's a good showing for 'courage and humanity'; six mentions of 'democracy' and its cognates, two references to 'human rights', one for the 'rule of law'. We have, further, one 'brutal dictatorship' and one 'dictator' outnumbered by one 'freedom' and one 'liberty'. With luck, the 'standard-bearers of the new Iraq' will see them off. But, whoops, we have no fewer than nine references to 'terrorists' or 'terrorism', five 'extremists', three 'fanatics', two 'fundamentalists', and a 'gospel of hate' to contend with. Who, we might ask, writes this ludicrous shite? If it's the Prime Minister himself, we may as well be resigned to our 'fate' (three references).
The BBC's fearless crusade against the Allied Coalition continues, meanwhile. Schedules over the Easter weekend changed, apparently, to eliminate satire. Wag the Dog — a Clinton-era political comedy, starring Dustin Hoffman, in which an American administration starts an overseas war (in the film, an entirely imaginary one, as it happens) in order to distract from its domestic troubles — was due to be screened at 11.35 p.m. on BBC2 on Saturday night. . . but was replaced instead by an anodyne thriller. A colleague, who came home from the pub specially early, he complains, to watch it, suspects political skulduggery. The BBC reassures me: 'It was caused by the overrunning of the golf.' Gulf? No. Golf.
To the Royal Geographical Society, for 1 the 'Intelligence Squared' debate on the future of the royal family. The motion at hand: 'The House of Windsor Is Falling Down (and we should let it).' For the motion: Professor Roy Greenslade, Roy Hattersley (Lord Hattersley, to you) and Dr Piers Brendon. Agin it: Penny Junor, Peter
Hitchens and (the nametag before him scrupulously awarding this noble wreckage all his titles) The Right Honourable The Lord St John of Fawsley. High-minded, it was not. Peter Hitchens sniped at Roy Hattersley by pointedly calling him 'Baron Hattersley'. Everyone sniped at Lord St John for being a groveller and obviously not having bothered to prepare a speech. Prof. Greenslade wooed the audience by boasting: 'You'll get no tittle-tattle from me . . . no royal shenanigans. . . I'm going to raise the tone of this debate. . . . Lord St John offended Dr Brendon by rambling, quite without artifice: 'Let us now. as Professor. . I can't remember his name. As Professor. . Brendon said. . . the awful thing is, I've forgotten what he did say!' Dr Brendon responded by calling him 'Lord St John of Boresly' and 'Lord Rickety'. The more one sees of these public eminences, the more one yearns — doesn't one? — for Her Majesty simply to dissolve Parliament and rule autocratically.
Towards the end of last week, I received 1 a sternly worded letter from the plugs ombudsman. He believes that this column has been sailing close to the wind with its repeated mentions of the brilliant Harry Mount's My Brief Career (Short Books, 224pp, £9.99). Further, he warns of as-yetunspecified reprisals should even one more extract be published from the genially written memoirs of Solihull's Tory MP John Taylor, Please Stay To The Adjournment (Brewin Books, 130pp, £13.95). With regret, we are forced to accede. I dare not face the penalties for gratuitous plugging. Look what happened to James Delingpole and Toby Young.
(""N n which subject, let's move to the question of Ann Widdecombe's literary influences. This redoubtable lady
recently submitted to an online discussion with readers of the Guardian, the newspaper for which she is currently in harness as an agony aunt. In among the predictable jocular torrents of abuse, the odd serious question was posed. What, she was asked, was her favourite book? 'All Quiet on the Western Front,' was her reply. 'Not for the faint-hearted, but it speaks loud and clear about the human cost of war.' Asked whether the brutal American noir writer James Ellroy was an influence, she confessed not. She also ignored the last question posed: 'Which do you consider to be cuter — kittens or penguins?'
From the brilliant British film director Oliver Parker (Othello, The Importance of Being Earnest) comes a touching parable about budget constraints in the British industry. While preparing to shoot his TV film about Samuel Pepys, starring Steve Coogan, Parker became aware that the money-men (anticipating, presumably, a series of cost-effective shots of a man in a dusty periwig scribbling at a desk) had allocated rather too little money to get dogs, cats or the Great Fire of London into shot. Solution? Rewrite the script, and make a virtue of a new catchphrase. Hence, shot of Pepys, on his roof, surrounded by smoke, looking down out of shot, and describing the capital city being consumed by fire. To camera: 'You'll have to take my word for it.'
Test this column be seen as / unreasonably hostile to an American president doing his best in difficult circumstances, I'd like, on his behalf, to direct web-literate readers to www.georgewbush.com/Compassion/Phot oAlbum.aspx?gallery =29. There, nesting in the website for his re-election campaign, is a section entitled 'Compassion'. It even includes a special photo-gallery of the President doing compassionate things. Hugging black primary school kids; reading aloud to children; 'showing support' for workers at an Aids treatment centre in Uganda. Really, it's very affecting.
verheard at a drinks party in an unnamed Cotswold location, in the course of a long and animated discussion about Tupperware parties: 'No, the best parties are Ann Summers . . they've got really great gear!' The discerning customer? The jockey short — or short jockey — enthusiast Zara Phillips.
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