Between the Sheets
As the tsunami death toll reached 155,000, killings in Iraq by insurgents multiplied and Mahmoud Abbas was elected leader of Palestine, there was no issue more important to the British tabloids this week than the outrageous events of Celebrity Big Brother.
The drama made daily headlines with such quality bastions of the printed word as the Daily Star and The Sun, as well it should have.
Columnists such as The Independent on Sunday's Yasmin Alibhai-Brown wondered why such erudite figures as Germaine Greer even entered the house with such Z-listers as failed DJ Lisa I'Anson and Kenzie from Blazin' Squad, and it was no surprise when the famed feminist walked on Tuesday.
Channel Four racing pundit McCririck is left as the programme's true star, spouting such insightful comments as: "Men should date ugly girls. They're grateful for what they get" and "I'm romantic. Big boobs have a chance. Flat chests, no chance." He also said of Greer: "She caused awful misery urging women to be above their station." Yes John, if Germaine can't stand the heat she should get back in the kitchen. Perhaps she should just reach back there and borrow your mangle from the 19th century where your attitude clearly resides.
The papers have also reported McCririck's moaning about having his beloved Diet Coke withdrawn.
Let's hope no eager whippersnapper in the drinks manufacturer's marketing department sees a golden opportunity to make the childish racing pundit their new 11.30 Diet Coke break hunk. Hold that thought.
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The desperate housewives of 10 and 11 Downing Street are at it again. Most papers reported the war of words between Blair and Brown, the gruesome twosome lamentably in charge of running the country, and their chastisement by Labour backbenchers (remember them?) for their behaviour on Monday night.
The row came to a head at the weekend following revelations printed in The Sunday Telegraph from 'Brown's Britain' by Robert Peston.
Apparently in July of this year the Chancellor said to the Prime Minister: "There is nothing that you could ever say to me now that I could ever believe." It's a pity you've come late to the party most of us have been at for the past seven years Gordon, but let's celebrate the fact that you've turned up at all.
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The Daily Mail wins Headline of the Week. The splash on Tuesday morning concerned a woman who was ordered to take anti-racism lessons after forgetting the name of an interpreter. Rebecca Miles, a white middle aged woman from the south of England - that most repressed of demographics - has become the latest target of the 'PC brigade' the Daily Mail so frequently laments (who'd have thought irrelevant lefties would be so regimented?) Mrs Miles said the interpreter's name "was Pamala, Popalam or Popadom - something like that", a remark for which she later apologised. The headline? POPADOM MADNESS.
13th Jan 2005