With incendiary comments on Iraq, Libya and Obama’s birth, the property tycoon has livened up the Republicans’ search for a 2012 candidate The bright lights of the Las Vegas strip were an apt setting for the Donald Trump carnival roadshow to end up in last week. Amid the garish neon of the gigantic Treasure Island Casino, the business mogul-turned-reality TV star-turned-potential Republican presidential candidate made his latest stop. Speaking at an event called The Reagan Revolution: From Ronald to Donald, Trump made his pitch to an audience of Nevada Republican bigwigs and curious onlookers in one of the key early-voting states in the nomination process. In the casino’s ballroom, which featured an ice statue of himself, Trump gave a virtuoso performance that was full of braggadocio and littered with expletives. “Our leaders are stupid, they are stupid people,” he said, before referring to the Chinese government as “motherfuckers” against whom he’d raise trade tariffs. Despite such a performance – and perhaps because of it – there is no doubt that Trump has injected a remarkable shot of adrenaline into the stilted Republican search for a nominee to take on Barack Obama next year. One perhaps should have expected no less from the flamboyant figure who is a household name in America not for his politics, but his TV show The Apprentice and his catchphrase, “You’re fired!” But, as Trump’s “will he, won’t he” campaign rolls on, the Republican party may be waking up to the fact that they have bitten off more than they can chew. Trump’s decision to make “birtherism” his first big issue and fan the conspiracy theories about Obama’s citizenship last week led to one of the more spectacular political bunfights of recent memory. Trump’s claims to have sent investigators to Hawaii who had uncovered evidence to support him were dismissed in stunning fashion by the Oval office. As Trump touched down last Wednesday in New Hampshire – another key early-voting state – the White House revealed the president’s long-form birth certificate, which birthers had said did not exist. So, instead of being treated as an emerging Republican champion with a tough pro-America agenda on China and business, Trump became a national media joke. Obama referred to him as a “carnival barker”. A thundering New York Times editorial called the Trump-inspired situation “… a profoundly low and debasing moment”. Fareed Zakaria, a CNN host, called Trump’s birtherism “coded racism”. CBS news anchor Bob Schieffer reacted to his questioning the standard of Obama’s college credentials, saying: “That’s just code for saying he got into law school because he’s black. This is an ugly strain of racism.” Such a media kicking would have sent any other potential candidate running for the hills. But not The Donald. He seemed overjoyed at the slew of headlines. “Today, I am very proud of myself,” he told the press in New Hampshire, before hinting that he will continue to explore the idea of a run. Next month he will attend a Tea Party rally in South Carolina, his growing collection of another early-voting state. His travels are certainly starting to look like a genuine campaign. His poll numbers among Republicans certainly put him among the leaders, with a Rasmussen survey showing him on top with 19%. “Trump obviously has a slice of the vote. The question is: how big a slice is it?” said Steve Mitchell, chairman of Republican-leaning political consulting firm Mitchell Research. That prospect has most Democrats sharing Trump’s delight at all the attention. Many had assumed he was in it just for the fame or to boost his TV show. But, increasingly, it seems he is serious – and even events like last week cannot deflect him from his path. Conversely, senior Republicans are nervous. Asked last week on CNN about his plans, Trump said he would make an announcement before June. “I think a lot of people will be happy,” he said. His impact has been so potentially divisive that many suspect those happy people would be his Democratic opponents, not supporters of the party he hopes to lead. Whatever his decision, and no matter how well he does in any nomination race, ,Trump himself cannot really lose. With the bouffant hairdo that is more instantly recognisable than any policy position, the billionaire has long been a master of the fame game and immune to setback. Despite scandals about his private life and business bankruptcies, he has always emerged from the headlines with his ego fully intact. As he traipsed around New Hampshire in a black limo complete with a security detail, he was swarmed by fans who asked for his autograph and endured only a few heckles on the street. He participated in the usual footwork of New Hampshire campaigning by pressing the flesh in a diner in Portsmouth and then later in Newick’s Lobster House in the village of Dover. But looking like a campaign does not mean that one can pull one off. Even a showman like Trump must know that if he does run he will face press scrutiny of his lavish lifestyle and sprawling business dealings. He already faces demands to release his tax returns, and the Huffington Post last week ran a story about suspected organised crime ties to some ex-business associates. His personal life will put off social conservatives who are a key segment of the Republican base: Trump is on his third marriage and not especially devout. His ostentatious lifestyle is out of step with a national mood still smarting from the “Great Recession”. “He has enormous problems with Republican voters,” Mitchell said. There are inconvenient truths like the fact that he has donated more campaign money to Democrats than Republicans, including Obama right-hand man Rahm Emanuel and Senate leader Harry Reid. Or that Trump has not bothered to vote in many elections in the past 20 years. Then there is his “foot-in-mouth” syndrome. Last week, he claimed a CNN poll showed him neck-and-neck with Obama. He repeated the claim in an interview on CNN itself. When CNN correctly denied it had ever conducted such a survey, Trump insisted he was right and it was wrong. Trump’s gift for reducing events down to simplistic and populist soundbites has few limits. On Libya, Trump bluntly said the US should just take the country’s oil, rather than assist rebels fighting Muammar Gaddafi. “We don’t know who the rebels are, we hear they come from Iran, we hear they’re influenced by Iran or al-Qaida, and, frankly I would go in, I would take the oil — and stop this baby stuff,” he told Fox News. It is a sentiment he has gone on to repeat several other times. Yet all this is just the tip of the iceberg, with far more likely to come. That has many top Republican strategists terrified. “When Donald Trump not only dominates the airwaves but also the Republican polls then you know that they are a party in trouble,” said Professor Bruce Gronbeck, a political expert at the University of Iowa. It is a general rule of US presidential politics that the middle ground “independents” hold the key to national victory. Yet Trump, by so aggressively advocating birtherism, has seen his support there dry up. In New Hampshire only 23% of independents have a positive view of him; in South Carolina it is 28% and Iowa 29%. Trump’s brand is becoming toxic to moderates and many Republicans fear the poison will start to infect their party, even if he does not win the nomination. Perhaps even if he does not run at all. Yet Trump is striking a chord in part of the American psyche. Away from the clamour over birtherism, there are other elements of his message that resonate. His strident talk against China, which he has accused of “raping” the US economy, is powerful stuff in a country struggling with the mass outsourcing of its manufacturing industry and high unemployment. Trump can say these things so bluntly because he is an outsider to politics: something that also appeals to many disenchanted Americans. He is filling a huge void in a Republican party that has struggled to build on its victory in last year’s mid-term elections. Instead of finding a united voice, the party appears deeply split between its Tea Party anti-government wing, still powerful social conservatives and a sliver of moderates. “Unifying a group like that looks next to impossible,” said Professor Shaun Bowler, a political scientist at the University of California at Riverside. No wonder then that the field of Republican candidates alongside Trump has failed to inspire. It contains semi-famous names such as Ron Paul and Mitt Romney, who have run and failed before. It includes congresswoman Michele Bachmann, from the far right and former senator Rick Santorum. There is Newt Gingrich, who has not held office since the mid-1990s and whose private life is even more colourful than Trump’s. There are virtual unknowns such as former Utah governor Jon Huntsman and former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty. The few well-known names – Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee – are still on the fence, with Palin looking likely to stay out. The field is so barren that in the first TV debate of the contest, planned for this week, only four potential candidates have agreed to turn up. “Republicans are run ragged at the moment trying to find anyone. It’s like the Keystone Cops driving around in a clown car,” said Bowler. No wonder Trump was still smiling. He has swaggered into a void in the Republican field and the top party bigwigs have only themselves to blame. Donald Trump US elections 2012 Republicans US politics United States Paul Harris guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …
With incendiary comments on Iraq, Libya and Obama’s birth, the property tycoon has livened up the Republicans’ search for a 2012 candidate The bright lights of the Las Vegas strip were an apt setting for the Donald Trump carnival roadshow to end up in last week. Amid the garish neon of the gigantic Treasure Island Casino, the business mogul-turned-reality TV star-turned-potential Republican presidential candidate made his latest stop. Speaking at an event called The Reagan Revolution: From Ronald to Donald, Trump made his pitch to an audience of Nevada Republican bigwigs and curious onlookers in one of the key early-voting states in the nomination process. In the casino’s ballroom, which featured an ice statue of himself, Trump gave a virtuoso performance that was full of braggadocio and littered with expletives. “Our leaders are stupid, they are stupid people,” he said, before referring to the Chinese government as “motherfuckers” against whom he’d raise trade tariffs. Despite such a performance – and perhaps because of it – there is no doubt that Trump has injected a remarkable shot of adrenaline into the stilted Republican search for a nominee to take on Barack Obama next year. One perhaps should have expected no less from the flamboyant figure who is a household name in America not for his politics, but his TV show The Apprentice and his catchphrase, “You’re fired!” But, as Trump’s “will he, won’t he” campaign rolls on, the Republican party may be waking up to the fact that they have bitten off more than they can chew. Trump’s decision to make “birtherism” his first big issue and fan the conspiracy theories about Obama’s citizenship last week led to one of the more spectacular political bunfights of recent memory. Trump’s claims to have sent investigators to Hawaii who had uncovered evidence to support him were dismissed in stunning fashion by the Oval office. As Trump touched down last Wednesday in New Hampshire – another key early-voting state – the White House revealed the president’s long-form birth certificate, which birthers had said did not exist. So, instead of being treated as an emerging Republican champion with a tough pro-America agenda on China and business, Trump became a national media joke. Obama referred to him as a “carnival barker”. A thundering New York Times editorial called the Trump-inspired situation “… a profoundly low and debasing moment”. Fareed Zakaria, a CNN host, called Trump’s birtherism “coded racism”. CBS news anchor Bob Schieffer reacted to his questioning the standard of Obama’s college credentials, saying: “That’s just code for saying he got into law school because he’s black. This is an ugly strain of racism.” Such a media kicking would have sent any other potential candidate running for the hills. But not The Donald. He seemed overjoyed at the slew of headlines. “Today, I am very proud of myself,” he told the press in New Hampshire, before hinting that he will continue to explore the idea of a run. Next month he will attend a Tea Party rally in South Carolina, his growing collection of another early-voting state. His travels are certainly starting to look like a genuine campaign. His poll numbers among Republicans certainly put him among the leaders, with a Rasmussen survey showing him on top with 19%. “Trump obviously has a slice of the vote. The question is: how big a slice is it?” said Steve Mitchell, chairman of Republican-leaning political consulting firm Mitchell Research. That prospect has most Democrats sharing Trump’s delight at all the attention. Many had assumed he was in it just for the fame or to boost his TV show. But, increasingly, it seems he is serious – and even events like last week cannot deflect him from his path. Conversely, senior Republicans are nervous. Asked last week on CNN about his plans, Trump said he would make an announcement before June. “I think a lot of people will be happy,” he said. His impact has been so potentially divisive that many suspect those happy people would be his Democratic opponents, not supporters of the party he hopes to lead. Whatever his decision, and no matter how well he does in any nomination race, ,Trump himself cannot really lose. With the bouffant hairdo that is more instantly recognisable than any policy position, the billionaire has long been a master of the fame game and immune to setback. Despite scandals about his private life and business bankruptcies, he has always emerged from the headlines with his ego fully intact. As he traipsed around New Hampshire in a black limo complete with a security detail, he was swarmed by fans who asked for his autograph and endured only a few heckles on the street. He participated in the usual footwork of New Hampshire campaigning by pressing the flesh in a diner in Portsmouth and then later in Newick’s Lobster House in the village of Dover. But looking like a campaign does not mean that one can pull one off. Even a showman like Trump must know that if he does run he will face press scrutiny of his lavish lifestyle and sprawling business dealings. He already faces demands to release his tax returns, and the Huffington Post last week ran a story about suspected organised crime ties to some ex-business associates. His personal life will put off social conservatives who are a key segment of the Republican base: Trump is on his third marriage and not especially devout. His ostentatious lifestyle is out of step with a national mood still smarting from the “Great Recession”. “He has enormous problems with Republican voters,” Mitchell said. There are inconvenient truths like the fact that he has donated more campaign money to Democrats than Republicans, including Obama right-hand man Rahm Emanuel and Senate leader Harry Reid. Or that Trump has not bothered to vote in many elections in the past 20 years. Then there is his “foot-in-mouth” syndrome. Last week, he claimed a CNN poll showed him neck-and-neck with Obama. He repeated the claim in an interview on CNN itself. When CNN correctly denied it had ever conducted such a survey, Trump insisted he was right and it was wrong. Trump’s gift for reducing events down to simplistic and populist soundbites has few limits. On Libya, Trump bluntly said the US should just take the country’s oil, rather than assist rebels fighting Muammar Gaddafi. “We don’t know who the rebels are, we hear they come from Iran, we hear they’re influenced by Iran or al-Qaida, and, frankly I would go in, I would take the oil — and stop this baby stuff,” he told Fox News. It is a sentiment he has gone on to repeat several other times. Yet all this is just the tip of the iceberg, with far more likely to come. That has many top Republican strategists terrified. “When Donald Trump not only dominates the airwaves but also the Republican polls then you know that they are a party in trouble,” said Professor Bruce Gronbeck, a political expert at the University of Iowa. It is a general rule of US presidential politics that the middle ground “independents” hold the key to national victory. Yet Trump, by so aggressively advocating birtherism, has seen his support there dry up. In New Hampshire only 23% of independents have a positive view of him; in South Carolina it is 28% and Iowa 29%. Trump’s brand is becoming toxic to moderates and many Republicans fear the poison will start to infect their party, even if he does not win the nomination. Perhaps even if he does not run at all. Yet Trump is striking a chord in part of the American psyche. Away from the clamour over birtherism, there are other elements of his message that resonate. His strident talk against China, which he has accused of “raping” the US economy, is powerful stuff in a country struggling with the mass outsourcing of its manufacturing industry and high unemployment. Trump can say these things so bluntly because he is an outsider to politics: something that also appeals to many disenchanted Americans. He is filling a huge void in a Republican party that has struggled to build on its victory in last year’s mid-term elections. Instead of finding a united voice, the party appears deeply split between its Tea Party anti-government wing, still powerful social conservatives and a sliver of moderates. “Unifying a group like that looks next to impossible,” said Professor Shaun Bowler, a political scientist at the University of California at Riverside. No wonder then that the field of Republican candidates alongside Trump has failed to inspire. It contains semi-famous names such as Ron Paul and Mitt Romney, who have run and failed before. It includes congresswoman Michele Bachmann, from the far right and former senator Rick Santorum. There is Newt Gingrich, who has not held office since the mid-1990s and whose private life is even more colourful than Trump’s. There are virtual unknowns such as former Utah governor Jon Huntsman and former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty. The few well-known names – Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee – are still on the fence, with Palin looking likely to stay out. The field is so barren that in the first TV debate of the contest, planned for this week, only four potential candidates have agreed to turn up. “Republicans are run ragged at the moment trying to find anyone. It’s like the Keystone Cops driving around in a clown car,” said Bowler. No wonder Trump was still smiling. He has swaggered into a void in the Republican field and the top party bigwigs have only themselves to blame. Donald Trump US elections 2012 Republicans US politics United States Paul Harris guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Even with 21st-century technology, predicting tornadoes is still largely a matter of guesswork, reports the New York Times . Scientists know the weather conditions that create tornadoes, but can’t accurately say when those conditions will be just right . “There’s a large crapshoot aspect,” says a senior scientist at the National Center…
Continue reading …Rural life often gets a bad rap: There’s no culture, no convenience, and locals are uneducated, we hear. It’s high time we examine the benefits of living in the country, writes Trent Hamm in the Christian Science Monitor . Indeed, the lifestyle can provide “a lot of economic and social opportunity,…
Continue reading …Mitt Romney tried to play up his recurring theme of an Obama “misery index” at a GOP forum last night, but he’s drawing attention instead for his choice of words that he immediately walked back. Noting that Ronald Reagan spoke of a similar index and “hung that around Jimmy Carter’s…
Continue reading …
Survey finds that burden of monitoring online threats is putting schools under strain A fifth of headteachers have been bullied by pupils or parents on Facebook and other social networking sites, a poll has found. Britain’s biggest headteachers’ union – the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) – warned that schools are increasingly having to call the police to deal with violent threats posted online. Schools now waste hours each week monitoring websites for abusive comments, the union claims. One in five heads told the union they had been hounded on social networking sites by pupils, ex-pupils and parents, while two-thirds claimed parents’ behaviour has got worse over the last few years. Some 1,362 heads responded to the poll. In one case, a teaching assistant discovered that pupils or parents had created a profile of him on Facebook and had posted a litany of abusive comments on it. It took him two months to get the web page taken down. In another case, parents started a campaign to get rid of a headteacher after her pupils were shown a slaughtered pig as part of a biology lesson. The head resigned. Later, the parents decided that they had made a mistake and asked her to come back. In other cases, schools have had to call the police to deal with vicious online threats to their headteachers. Speaking at the NAHT’s annual conference in Brighton, Russell Hobby, the union’s general secretary, said cyber-abuse would soon be more of a worry for a school’s reputation than Ofsted, the school inspectorate. Heads will vote on Sunday over whether the union’s national executive should lobby ministers to develop “robust national guidance” on cyberbullying. At the moment, unions issue their own advice on this. Hobby said online bullying could be trivial or nasty. “It can be just a matter of pupils and parents posting that they don’t like what a headteacher wears or it can be a campaign to get rid of a head. There is anonymity for those who post online and they often seem to think that what they are writing isn’t really real because it’s on a website.” Sue Street, the director of e-learning at Harrow High School in north London, said schools were having to waste time monitoring sites such as Wikipedia. “Schools now need someone to check new media and the amount of time this takes is disproportionate. We are having to have long conversations [with website owners] in the US to have things taken down.” She said there was a “growing trend” for pupils to record their classmates and teachers in lessons. “This is also about what happens to that footage,” she said. Earlier this week, a survey by the NAHT revealed that one in 10 heads had been assaulted by a parent on school grounds. Meanwhile, headteachers have warned they might repeat last year’s boycott of national tests for 10- and 11-year-olds. Last year, a quarter of the 17,000 primary schools in England boycotted the tests, known as Sats, in maths and English. They say the results are used to compile league tables which do not give a fair picture of a school’s strengths. The government is expected to publish the findings of its review into Sats later this year. Heads said unless the review conceded that the tests should be marked by pupils’ teachers, rather than by external markers, they may repeat last year’s boycott. Headteachers are also planning to vote on whether to ballot for their first ever national strike over changes to public sector pensions. Delegates at the NAHT conference are expected to vote in favour of the ballot on Sunday. This could trigger the first industrial action by heads in the NAHT’s 100-year-plus history and would set them on a collision course with government. The National Union of Teachers and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers voted in April to ballot members for a strike over pensions. Bullying Facebook Education policy Sats Schools Internet Social networking Trade unions Teaching Jessica Shepherd guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …
St James’s Palace confirms William will be going back to work this week after wedding watched by peak TV audience of 24m Late on Saturday morning, as the happy couple’s helicopter lifted off from the gardens of Buckingham Palace and Prince Charles reclaimed his Aston Martin, minus the “Just Wed” plates, the majority of commentators were agreed: the wedding of William and Kate had been something of a triumph for “The Firm”. A judicious mixture of pomp and, just as crucially, populism, had ensured a fair wind for the British monarchy for another generation at least. John Hanson, 81, from Hemel Hempstead, expressed a view held by many in Friday’s throngs. “It’s an apolitical stance I expect from them, not 19th-century attitudes. Some of the world’s republics are quite well run but the scope for unfortunate appointments in heads of state is huge. Kate Middleton being a commoner is vitally important for the royals to justify themselves and show they are worth having.” Like many, Hanson was not a fan of Prince Charles. But just as normal service was resuming around the UK; as royalists nursed hangovers while republicans relaxed, there was a mini-bombshell from St James’ Palace – the honeymoon was on hold and Prince William was going back to work this week. “The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have chosen not to depart for a honeymoon immediately,” read a statement from the palace. Instead, the couple will spend the weekend at a secret location in the UK and the Duke will return to his work as a pilot next week. The location of their future honeymoon will also be kept secret. “The couple have asked that their privacy be respected during the coming weekend and during their honeymoon,” the statement said. It only deepened the honeymoon mystery – William had booked two weeks off and Kate bought bikinis two weeks ago, but the rest was pure speculation. Jordan had been the bookies odds-on destination. King Abudallah has a nice place he had offered them, but then the newlyweds have several chums with exotic getaways. Mustique and the British Virgin islands were getting good odds as well… until Saturday, when someone tried to put a £5,000 bet on Kenya, raising suspicions of a tip-off gleaned from squiffy guests at the reception which rolled on until 3am. Those 300 guests, who were entertained by British singer Ellie Goulding and danced under glitterballs in Buckingham Palace’s state rooms, drank champagne and ate bacon butties and ice-cream. Goulding serenaded the newlyweds with her hit version of Your Song, written by Elton John. The music was heavy on kitschy disco and dance music. Lots of Abba, Kanye West and Beyoncé. Whether the social media world got its much-tweeted wish that Prince Harry and bridesmaid Pippa Middleton would get together seems unlikely, despite Harry’s whispered, “You do look very beautiful today, seriously,” on the balcony. Even after the royal wedding had long ceased to monopolise the
Continue reading …The tornado death toll keeps rising steadily. The seven-state total is now at 339, with nearly 250 of those in Alabama, reports AP . What’s worse, rescuers in Tuscaloosa say the city’s confirmed toll of 39 feels low, with scores of people still unaccounted for, notes the Tuscaloosa Times . The biggest…
Continue reading …
Investigation finds evidence of draconian rules and excessive overtime to meet western demand for iPhones and iPads An investigation into the conditions of Chinese workers has revealed the shocking human cost of producing the must-have Apple iPhones and iPads that are now ubiquitous in the west. The research, carried out by two NGOs, has revealed disturbing allegations of excessive working hours and draconian workplace rules at two major plants in southern China. It has also uncovered an “anti-suicide” pledge that workers at the two plants have been urged to sign, after a series of employee deaths last year. The investigation gives a detailed picture of life for the 500,000 workers at the Shenzhen and Chengdu factories owned by Foxconn, which produces millions of Apple products each year. The report accuses Foxconn of treating workers “inhumanely, like machines”. Among the allegations made by workers interviewed by the NGOs – the Centre for Research on Multinational Companies and Students & Scholars Against Corporate Misbehaviour (Sacom) – are claims that: ■ Excessive overtime is routine, despite a legal limit of 36 hours a month. One payslip, seen by the Observer , indicated that the worker had performed 98 hours of overtime in a month. ■ Workers attempting to meet the huge demand for the first iPad were sometimes pressured to take only one day off in 13. ■ In some factories badly performing workers are required to be publicly humiliated in front of colleagues. ■ Crowded workers’ dormitories can sleep up to 24 and are subject to strict rules. One worker told the NGO investigators that he was forced to sign a “confession letter” after illicitly using a hairdryer. In the letter he wrote: “It is my fault. I will never blow my hair inside my room. I have done something wrong. I will never do it again.” ■ In the wake of a spate of suicides at Foxconn factories last summer, workers were asked to sign a statement promising not to kill themselves and pledging to “treasure their lives”. Foxconn produced its first iPad at Chengdu last November and expects to produce 100m a year by 2013. Last year Apple sold more than 15m iPads worldwide and has already sold close to five million this year. When the allegations were put to Foxconn by the Observer , manager Louis Woo confirmed that workers sometimes worked more than the statutory overtime limit to meet demand from western consumers, but claimed that all the extra hours were voluntary. Workers claim that, if they turn down excessive demands for overtime, they will be forced to rely on their basic wage: workers in Chengdu are paid only 1,350 yuan (£125) a month for a basic 48-hour week, equivalent to about 65p an hour. Asked about the suicides that have led to anti-suicide netting being fitted beneath the windows of workers’ dormitories, Woo said: “Suicides were not connected to bad working conditions. There was a copy effect. If one commits suicide, then others will follow.” In a statement, Apple said: “Apple is committed to ensuring the highest standards of social responsibility throughout our supply base. Apple requires suppliers to commit to our comprehensive supplier code of conduct as a condition of their contracts with us. We drive compliance with the code through a rigorous monitoring programme, including factory audits, corrective action plans and verification measures.” Apple China iPad iPhone Gethin Chamberlain guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …
Politicians and celebrities will refuse to answer BBC veteran’s difficult questions, says Labour MP Chris Bryant The BBC’s Andrew Marr will be “hobbled” in his role as a frontline BBC interviewer because politicians and celebrities will refuse to answer awkward personal questions from now on, a senior Labour MP has warned. Chris Bryant, the former Europe minister, said Marr could not expect political leaders or anyone else to reply to his questions about their private lives after it was revealed last week that he had taken out a superinjunction to prevent reporting of an alleged extramarital affair. Bryant, who was tormented by the media after he appeared on a gay dating website in his underpants, said: “People will certainly look askance at him. He is not going to be able to ask the personal questions without people, including politicians, sticking their tongues out at him and saying ‘superinjunction’ and refusing to answer.” Marr returns to the screen today only five days after admitting that he had taken out the superinjunction. He will be interviewing both David Cameron and Nick Clegg before Thursday’s local elections, and those to the devolved assemblies in Scotland and Wales, as well as the referendum on changing the way MPs are elected. In one television interview with Gordon Brown, Marr repeatedly pushed the then prime minister about his imperfect eyesight. Referring to the interview, Bryant said yesterday: “Andrew asked some very personal questions to Gordon Brown about his eyesight and whether he took drugs. I don’t think he will be able to do that sort of thing again.” The former prime minister was furious about the personal line of questioning and made his views known as he left the studio. “Andrew Marr is a very personable fellow but this does raise questions about his credibility and I am sure the BBC will be thinking about this,” Bryant added. A journalist friend of Marr said this weekend it was “business as usual” as far as the presenter was concerned, with the same rigorous questioning expected on air, and the same respect accorded to guests. A BBC news spokesman confirmed that the corporation shares this attitude. “The superinjunction is a private matter for Andrew. From the point of view of BBC News, we have seen no evidence whatsoever that Andrew’s journalism has been compromised in any way.” But some commentators have made comparisons with the ignominious departure of Angus Deayton, longtime chair of the topical quiz Have I Got News For You . Deayton left the show abruptly following tabloid revelations about his private life involving alleged criminal drug-taking. Asking political guests about their own misdemeanours became difficult for the comedian and actor, and Deayton has only recently returned to the BBC as the host of a Radio 4 game show. While the Andrew Marr Show focuses on parliamentary and policy issues, recent years have seen Marr pose questions about the vexed personal lives of several prominent guests. When John Prescott went on the show at the end of his career as a parliamentary MP, Marr referred explicitly to the affair the deputy prime minister had been revealed to have conducted with a colleague. “Biggest regret probably personal rather than political over the last 10 years?” the presenter suggested. “Yes, well, that was a disappointment and I, you know, I let people down, and I think I’ve made it clear…” responded Prescott. Last September Marr quizzed Ed Miliband about the impact of the battle for the leadership and his defeat of his brother David on his wider family. When Miliband underlined his love for his elder brother, Marr pressed the point. “He looked pretty shattered, I have to say, after it all. He must be pretty despondent about all of this?” Miliband replied that of course his brother was disappointed, but had shown “amazing generosity”. “And what about your mother?” asked Marr. “Is she cross with you for doing this, or is she just pleased?” Miliband replied that she was “relieved that the contest is over, put it that way. She’s certainly not cross.” Similarly, when the foreign secretary William Hague was prompted to deny publicly rumours that he was having an “improper relationship” with a male aide and went on to reveal that his wife Ffion had suffered several miscarriages, Marr raised the issue on the show with one of Hague’s cabinet colleagues, education secretary Michael Gove. Gove replied: “I feel admiration for the dignity with which he has always handled himself. There have been all sorts of attempts in the past to throw stuff at him, not least when he was leader.” Marr is said to be aware that several Sunday newspapers are chasing more details of the alleged affair with a female political journalist. Andrew Marr Superinjunctions Privacy & the media BBC Television industry Toby Helm Vanessa Thorpe guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …