Diane Abbott – Part 2 “Reading his [Hester’s] remarks I was upset but not surprised.  This is partly because I am hardened to racist abuse  I receive hundreds of abusive emails, phone calls and  letters monthly, and the numbers shoot up whenever I am in the media.” ~ Diane Abbott, March 2024 This is the […]

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Michael Gove In a week where Rishi Sunak called a surprise General Election (on the Sun/Pluto trine), there have been more Tory MPs announcing they are standing down.  None more prominent than Michael Gove, often regarded as an Architect of the Tory Party in the last 14 years, despite two unsuccessful leadership bids.  Regarded as […]

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Paula Vennells “What is it about this seemingly mild-mannered, devout woman that caused her to preside over a reign of total corporate psychopathy?” ~ Marina Hyde Paula Vennells, former CEO of the Post Office, appears this week in front of the government’s statutory Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry, over the course of three days.  I […]

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Frank Field (1942 -2024) “Frank had integrity, intelligence and deep commitment to the causes he believed in.  He was an independent thinker never constrained by conventional wisdom but always pushing at the frontier of new ideas”. ~ Tony Blair Labour MP Frank Field died this week at the age of 81.  He was strong in […]

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Salman Rushdie Less than two years ago, Salman Rushdie was stabbed 12 times on stage in New York by an attacker who thought him “disingenuous”.  It would not have been a surprising event decades ago when he was prominently facing a fatwa called for by the Ayatollah Ruhollah for writing “The Satanic Verses”, but felt […]

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O.J. Simpson (1947 – 2024) “They were a dramatic, fractious, mutually obsessed couple before they married, after they married, after they divorced in 1992, and after they reconciled.” ~ Sheila Weller American football star, actor, murder suspect O.J. Simpson died this week, from prostate cancer, at the age of 76.  Although he was unanimously acquitted […]

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Diane Abbott “It’s like trying not to be racist but you see Diane Abbott on the TV and you’re just like, I hate, you just want to hate all black women because she’s there” ~ Frank Hester A shocking statement reported this week from Frank Hester a few years ago had a wave of sympathy […]

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Lindsay Hoyle “Just when you hoped you’d reached rock bottom, parliament finds a way of going still lower…Everyone wanted a ceasefire.  Only they wanted their own ceasefire, not anyone else’s ceasefire.” ~ John Crace You will have seen the chaos in Parliament this week, specifically Wednesday evening.  It was to have been the day for […]

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Alexei Navalny (1976 – 2024) “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing” ~ Alexei Navalny We learned on Friday of the death at the age of 47 of that bravest of men, Alexei Navalny, who dared to stand up to Vladimir Putin, in the hope of […]

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Mr Bates vs The Post Office “When you watch a drama, you’re looking at the screen, and thinking…’Oh, poor me!  Poor me!  That could be me!” ~ Gwyneth Hughes, Scriptwriter The programme aired at 9 pm on New Year’s Day, and ran for four consecutive days.  I cannot recall a time when a docu-drama has […]

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