Tuesday, 18 December, 2007
- 18 Dec 07, 05:50 PM
Lib Dems pick a new leader (again)
has scraped through to win the Liberal Democrat leadership election. His majority of 511 votes over his rival Chris Huhne was anything but resounding, in fact it was the closest ever leadership election in the history of the Liberal Democrats. The former leader Charles Kennedy on his demise, said of his party that they had "passed on the knife to a new generation鈥. So will Nick Clegg be able to unite his party and make this the last leadership election for a while? Jeremy will be speaking to Nick Clegg and we will be assessing his prospects with our political panel.
Economy
Governor of the Bank of England Mervyn King was in front of the Treasury Select Committee this morning answering their questions on the strength of the British economy and on who was the source for the Sunday Times report on how low morale in the Treasury was hampering its response to the Northern Rock crisis. Stephanie Flanders will be explaining what it all means.
South Africa
In an South Africa's ruling party the African National Congress have now finished casting their votes for a new leader. The front runner is Jacob Zuma who will then be the likely President of South Africa in 2009 when Thabo Mbeki's term ends. We should have the result of the election before we go on air. Peter Marshall has been looking at Jacob Zuma's controversial past and what his election will mean for the ANC and for South Africa.
Ben Parkinson
Lance Bombardier was serving with the 7th Parachute Regiment Royal Horse Artillery when he lost both legs in an explosion in Afghanistan a year ago. The 23-year-old sustained 37 injuries in total, including ones to the brain, spine, skull, spleen and chest, yet he was awarded less than half of the compensation available because of the way the Ministry of Defence scheme is calculated. In our series of End of Year interviews Kirsty has been talking to Ben's mother Diane Dernie about her son's ordeal and her campaign to improve the treatment and compensation given to injured soldiers.
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So: sounds like we have all now been asked to underwrite Northern Rock to the tune of 拢50-55 billion (roughly 拢2,000 per person)? And the personal
banking data of 25 million+ citizens
of the UK lost by a Labour government
is still "missing" from HM Revenue & Customs ...... At what point does a
Minister/PM step up to the plate to take the political responsbility for
this? And when do we get an election so that we the voters get a say too?
Not just on this but also on defeat in Basra, Trident renewal & sleaze?
The Liberals have now had an election
contest for a new leader - so what is
now standing in the way of a General
Election apart from Labour dithering?
Brown says he doesn't look at polls?!
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Whatever the new Lib-Dem leader claims to represent they are still wedded to eco-fascist inspired taxes, with the primary aim of ethnically cleansing the countryside of its indigenous people. The penny is starting to drop and here in the Ribble Valley the Lib-Dems were almost wiped out as a political force locally. The must think that the average " country person " is pretty illiterate when in truth many pass the Eleven Plus and go to grammar school. They are not going to be fooled with an alleged 4p cut in income taxes if they face thing like higher fuel duty and perhaps even taxes on domestic utility bills and a possible extra tax on coal.
Perhaps The most potentially dangerous eco-fascists are CPRE, It sounds as though CPRE is planning to turn the countryside into some sort of executive " green " theme park with no place for the indigenous population unless they are willing to become minimum wage slaves. However, CPRE does exhibit eco-fascist tendencies and with it the virtual ethnic cleansing of the indigenous population. CPRE is yet another lobby group with no interests in anybody except the rich people who do most of the polluting in the countryside at present. You only have to look at the people who run it. One of them isn't even true British and resides here like some virtual tourist who has never gone home except for a few years.
The floated Settle weight limit has turned into a formal proposal and they are taking a traffic survey.
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Why is Newsnight - and indeed any other news outlet apart from the Guardian - pretty much ignoring the invalid donations received by the Conservatives in David Cameron's own constituency? Given the admittedly more serious problems Labour have had on this subject, and the vehemence with which Cameron has criticised them, surely there's a relevant story here?
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Isn't 17 out of 30 Lib Dem target seats held by the Tories actually closer to half of seats than two-thirds?
But then that wouldn't fit the pit the two young leaders against each other story would it?
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X-Factors
Reference was made twice in your programme to the earlier background of Mr. Clegg; the disruption of his chilhood, the reunition, and the superb education in the greater European context. The first during your introduction to the pending candidates, the second during the acceptance speech by Mr. Clegg himself. May we discover what this might be referring to?
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Superb Jeremy tonight (40/10) - I almost choked with laughter when he asked Nick Clegg what were 10 interesting things about him!!!Ha ha ha. It has to be the funniest interview of the year!!!! Definitly classic youtube.com material! Loved the discussion on the couch with Oly Grender/Dan Finkelstein/Peter Hyman on Nick Clegg. Very interesting film on Zuma too. However, the creme de la creme has to be Paul Mason in a tie for the 2nd time this year!!:-)
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INTEGRITY INTEGRITY INTEGRITY
Watching Clegg鈥檚 fervour and associated lack of logic, and his detachment from the meaning of 鈥渄emocracy鈥 I had a sense of Alastair Campbell d茅j脿 vu. He clearly is as self-right as Blair was and equally immune from reality. I recently pointed out that any system yielding Thatcher, Major, Blair and Brown 鈥 all demonstrably weird 鈥 needs fundamental 鈥渁ttention鈥. It would appear the system has yielded another of 鈥渋ts own鈥 Nick Clegg. I understand he claimed he was outside the Westminster malaise. It would appear that a symptom of that disease is: you don鈥檛 know you鈥檝e caught it.
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British Council update - they're in trouble (still) in Kerala; they are (still) promoting the survey Jeremy
Paxman trashed five weeks ago; and
apparently their Arts Department is about to be axed this week ?(or so
claims The Sunday Times 16 Decemb);
and then there is the very curious case of Russia where BC'd recently closed 9 regional offices but then created a diplomatic incident when the Russians told them to close an office in St Petersburg where the
local man is Neil Kinnock's son?!
Lord Kinnock chairs British Council.
[for further details.updates see: ]
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It is amazing how much left wing bias is running within the 大象传媒, Mr Paxman keept his mouth shut when Mr Clegg ranted that "no government anywhere in the world, could deport 600,000 in one go" why didn't Mr Paxman say, "Your right Mr Clegg but, nobody is saying gather up all 600,000, hold them in the same place and then deport all 600,000 at the same time! but they could deport these ILLEGAL immigrants over the next few years."
Why is the 大象传媒 so scared of allowing any other political view other than left wing?
The highest rated political talk show in the world, is Fox News channels the O'Reily Factor, and the reason its the highest rated is because it is the only news talk show that allows its anchor to question the left, why will not one Britsih channel allow such a program?
Paxman is in the bag for the left, along with all the others, which is making him the same as all the rest, boring!
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the idea that fox news and the o'reilly factor is some sort of debate pinnacle is as scarey as it is laughable - he questions the left because as a heavily partisan republican he provides fascist panto in effect for the right. Haven't you seen screenwipe?!?! (or the channel itself for that matter)
Also good stuff for Nick Clegg sounding like a human with a grasp of politics in the real world and not just another politician sprouting disconnected nonsense.
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Martyn (4),
Aye, I noticed that too. But weren't we told recently that 'arts' graduates don't do maths...
xx
ed
P.S. I did enjoy the "10 interesting things" gambit.
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