Bono praises Pence and presumably not for a bet

No Rock And Roll Fun isn't - you might have noticed - as busy as it has been traditionally, mainly because who the hell has the energy to write about an ecosystem that has somehow evolved Rag N Bone Man and everyone takes him seriously?

But the blog remains open, and from time to time I'll be posting here when there's something that warrants it. And something that warrants it is... well, this:

Enjoyed chatting w/ Bono at @MunSecConf. Discussed prior effort to twice pass Africa AIDS assistance & future security in developing nations pic.twitter.com/LJcvF4mXid

— Vice President Pence (@VP) February 18, 2017

Yes, that's long-time friend of the unpleasant Bono shaking warmly the hand of Mike Pence, enabler-in-chief to Donald Trump. This was during a meeting yesterday in Munich.

Bono also took the chance to praise Pence. He lauded Pence for "hitting the ground running", which is a bit like applauding bird flu for being especially virulent. Then tried to find a reason for touching the man that would play well to the liberal audience Bono believes still values him:

According to a pool report, the two men shared an exchange about the 2003 passage of the President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief and its 2008 renewal, which Pence advocated for as an Indiana congressman.

"Twice on the House floor you defended that. That’s how we know you," Bono, who has been a vocal proponent of the fight against AIDS, told Pence.

"And we really appreciate it," he added.

It's true, Pence DID support the Emergency Plan back in 2008. However, this was the same Pence who - in 2000 - tried to derail the Ryan White Care Act:

“Congress should support the reauthorization of the Ryan White Care Act only after completion of an audit to ensure that federal dollars were no longer being given to organizations that celebrate and encourage the types of behaviors that facilitate the spreading of the HIV virus,” read an LGBT section of Pence’s website, called Strengthening the American Family.

So had he changed his mind since then, and is he helping the fight against AIDS?

Well, no. He's making it worse, and singlehandedly helped create an HIV crisis in Indiana:

Pence first laid the groundwork for Indiana’s HIV outbreak as a congressman back in 2011, when the House passed his amendment to defund Planned Parenthood. Then in 2013, Pence’s first year as governor of Indiana, Scott County’s one Planned Parenthood closed in the wake of public health spending cuts. Since that particular Planned Parenthood was also the county’s only HIV testing center, there was no longer a place for the county’s 24,000 residents to get tested.

Nearly 20 percent of Scott County residents live below the poverty line. Injection drug use there is a major problem, increasing the risk of HIV outbreak.

Fast-forward to 2015. Local health officials began to report HIV cases linked to intravenous prescription opioid use in Scott County. Scott County residents were sharing needles to inject their opioids, and nobody was getting tested.

The situation quickly spiraled out of control. At the height of the outbreak, 20 new cases of HIV were being diagnosed each week, reaching a total of nearly 200 cases by the time the outbreak was finally under control.

Maybe if Bono had a spine, or perhaps didn't need to be loved so much, he might have mentioned this.

Maybe if Bono had a spine, he'd have drawn the link between the defunding of sexual health providers in Indiana, and the Trump-Pence White House's first executive order. That's the one which pulls funding from any organisation working overseas which mentions abortions as an option.

The executive order was restoring an older, Bush-era rule. And how did that work out?

Implementation of the global gag rule went well beyond abortion to effectively limit all discussions of family planning, including condom use to prevent HIV infection and multiyear spacing of pregnancies to avoid maternal deaths. Organizations as diverse as the World Health Organization, the United Nations Population Fund and Family Health International lost millions of dollars in support from the US government during the years the gag rule was enforced.

Bono - who is such a useful idiot he's more the Swiss Army Knife of Idiots - is shaking the hand of a man who has created an HIV crisis in his home state, and is part of a White House that's making rules that will stop condom use and education overseas, and praising him as a great warrior in the fight against HIV.

After this meeting, Bono moved on to take a selfie with Famine, noting that the famous Horseman had really "cut through and found a way to persuade people to eat up their leftovers."

Twittergem: Spector

Spector released a single last year called Born In The EU.

Go on, admit it, you hadn't thought about Spector for a long time, had you?

Funnily enough, they've just had a minor role to play in politics in 2017 already. Or at least political journalism:

Can anyone confirm that @nickmacpherson2 definitely is former @hmtreasury head? @ChrisGiles_ @StewartWood @faisalislam

— AndrewSparrow (@AndrewSparrow) January 3, 2017

@AndrewSparrow I'm pretty certain it's him, came across account cos he's followed by son Fred Macpherson who's the singer in Spector.

— Jim Waterson (@jimwaterson) January 3, 2017

Kate Bush: the darling's bad; for May

Kate Bush doesn't give a lot of interviews. After the last twenty-four hours, she might figure she'll do rather fewer in future.

As part of a wide-ranging discussion with Elio Iannacci for Macleans Magazine, the conversation turned to politics - and, in particular, Hillary Clinton's inability to seize the White House. It was here that Kate uttered the words which curdled many a morning yoghurt:

We have a female prime minister here in the UK. I actually really like her and think she’s wonderful. I think it’s the best thing that’s happened to us in a long time. She’s a very intelligent woman but I don’t see much to fear. I will say it is great to have a woman in charge of the country. She’s very sensible and I think that’s a good thing at this point in time.

Now, Kate Bush talking warmly about a Tory prime minister might be disappointing, but surely at a time when we've got actual fascists about to take office space in the White House, the small mercy that she wasn't bellowing "Brexit now" and bigging up the Farage must count for something.

More importantly, if you're going to quote the reply, you should probably look at the question, too:

A track called “Waking the Witch”—which was released in 1985—was performed for Before The Dawn. You once said that the song was about “the fear of women’s power.” With regards to Hillary Clinton’s recent defeat, do you think that this fear is stronger than ever?

So when Kate was talking about not having any reason to fear, she wasn't saying from May's policies, but fear of the idea of a woman leading a nation. Her comment was about temperament and gender, not policy and manifesto.

That's still disappointing - she seems to have confused May's caught in the headlights paralysis for a softly, softly caution - but reading Twitter over the last 24 hours you might have thought that Bush had been found negotiating the sale of NHS hospitals direct to Richard Branson.

And it's possible that Kate Bush does wholeheartedly embrace the Tory government, from the strange smell leaking out of Jeremy Hunt, through the slithering of Boris Johnson, to the chums of Liam Fox. And, let's face it, she's comfortably off and clearly had a lot of piano lessons as a small child, neither of which are signifiers of dyed-in-the-wool socialism.

But this interview doesn't really give much evidence one way or the other.

The really problematic bit of the interview was this exchange:

Q: Stephen Hawking recently said the Earth only has 1,000 years left. As someone who has written about environmental issues, does that alarm you?

A: Well, nobody really knows, do they? They told Stephen Hawking he only had a year left to live and how many years ago was that? You can’t know it all. If ever there’s been somebody to hold as an icon of sheer determination and willpower, it’s that guy, let alone any of the things he’s done scientifically. I’m sure that’s his driving force, but he’s a miracle and an aspiration.

For "someone who has written about environmental issues", giving an answer which ignores the environment and instead focuses on how Stephen Hawking didn't accept a diagnosis is heartbreaking. It seems to be implying that all we need to do abotu climate change is pop over to the burning fires of Siberia, stick up a couple of motivational posters, tell the planet to believe in itself and everything will be fine.

In all the coverage of Bush's interview yesterday, BBC News came up with the oddest angle:

Bush previously wrote a song for a sketch on a 1990 episode of TV series The Comic Strip, about the former Labour Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone.

The lyrics included: "Look to the left and to the right. We need help and there's nobody in sight. Where is the man that we all need? Well tell him he's to come and rescue me. Ken is the man that we all need. Ken is the leader of the GLC."
The track also describes Livingstone as "a sex machine".

This isn't wrong, but it doesn't really make much sense in the context of something she actually said about a politician - the Ken song was a soundtrack to an imaginary Hollywood movie about the GLC and part of that framing. If you really wanted to make something relevant out of it, you might have mentioned how both the movie and the satire gleefully cast Thatcher as the villain of the piece, and the gender politics around the last female Prime Minister. But I suppose 'has she written a song about a politician' was the only box they were looking to tick.

Labour: I pity the Foos

The Labour Party - increasingly the Freddie And The Dreamers of British politics - is having a torrid time of it at the moment, as it struggles to try and find a leader who can get through the day without making Theresa May giggle with joy.

In the midst of the current leadership election, the party is beset by the political version of Do You Remember Bagpuss - purges, entryism, jokes about Derek Hatton's suits. I'm half expecting to switch on the Ten O'Clock News to catch a package where Jamie Theakston, Kate Thornton and Stuart Maconie try to remember the lyrics to The Red Flag.

Ah, but purges are awkward things, and apparently a Labour Party member has been suspended for the oddest of reasons. At least according to the Daily Mail:

Labour has suspended a new member from the party and denied a vote in the leadership election after she posted about her love of rock band Foo Fighters on Facebook.

Catherine Starr, a supporter of Jeremy Corbyn, was shocked to receive a letter from the party's General Secretary Iain McNicol telling her that following a vetting procedure she was being refused full membership as she had 'shared inappropriate content on Facebook'.

It said this related to a post on March 5 when she had shared a clip of Dave Grohl's band and wrote 'I f****** love the Foo Fighters'.

We should approach this all with a level of caution - we're living in a weird period of politics where you can't even trust an old man sitting in a vestibule, and this is the Daily Mail whose last honest piece of reporting on the Labour Party was "Kinnock resigns".

To be honest, it's not clear that Starr was suspended over a Foo Fighters post - the Mail does concede she'd been sharing other prime content that day:

That day Mrs Starr, 33, had also shared a friend's inoffensive poster about animal free cosmetics and a cartoon about veganism.

You know how much the Mail loves animal rights, right?

It is possible that the NEC has some ongoing beef with the Foo Fighters. Or maybe they see "Foo Fighters" as some sort of code for those who have recently joined the Labour Party for nefarious purposes.

It's much more likely that a party which has raised the bar on disarray to a level which would be offputting to Ekateríni Stefanídi have made an honest mis... okay, a dishonest mistake. They probably got the day of the offending post wrong, or the name of the offending poster wrong, or maybe confused the Foo Fighters and Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds.

The party hasn't responded to the story yet, but almost certainly will deny it, admit it but say the details are wrong, look crossly over its spectacles at us, and pretend to never have heard of the Foo Fighters. All at the same time.

Steve Brookstein joins the Brexit debate

Sorry, Steve, did you have something to say?

The irony is Conservative women have less hang ups about sex than Labour women. Generally speaking. #MarkSteel

— Steve Brookstein (@stevebrookstein) July 2, 2016

Let's just pause for a moment and be impressed that Steve is using both "irony" and "less" incorrectly, almost as if he was trying to flush pedants out of a hedgerow.

How do you know this, Steve? Do you run a YouGov poll on anyone you might have sex with? Or have you gathered this knowledge slowly over the years - "she was willing to break out the nipple clamps and espoused a Friedmanite approach to the money supply. That happens so often."

Charlotte Church: "Woman has accountant" shocker

Let's turn to Guido Fawkes. Guido persists in using his pseudonym as if we don't know he's Paul Staines, like a crap unmasked superhero still booking hotel rooms as "QTipMan" even although the receptionists always reply "okay, Mr. Staines, that's booked for you now." And he's managed to parlay his blog into a column in the News Of The World - the paper which still uses the pseudonym The Sun On Sunday. It's from this let's pretend world that he's tried to attack Charlotte Church following her appearance at the anti-austerity march yesterday.

Staines lives up to his chosen pseudonym, of course. Much as Fawkes was a dupe who got to do the dirty work of richer, more powerful types and ended up looking like a nasty piece of work, so too Staines trots out an attack line to try and deflect criticism of the government.

His problem with Church? Why, she calls for closing of tax loopholes, and yet... sorry, what was the pisspoor attack line again?

After joining the People’s Assembly against Austerity – whose aims include ‘increasing taxes on the super-rich’ and ‘closing tax loopholes’ – perhaps the Cardiff crooner turned campaigner should look at her own economy.

Church is the director of five companies that are all registered to the London address of Thomas Harris Accountants.

“Lowering and deferring tax is, of course, a key aim” boasts the firm’s website, by “taking advantage of allowances and reliefs of which many people are unaware.”

I don't think that there's a single major accountant which doesn't offer to minimise tax for its clients, and I don't think there's anyone who has a company that doesn't require some sort of accountancy service. So, really, this is on a par with going "well, David Attenborough calls for a reduction in fossil fuel use, but he has a car which uses petrol."

If Forkstaines has something solid - Church deliberately booking gigs in Bratislava for tax write-offs; a massive scheme to use foxes to channel cash through Nutwood; something like that - maybe there's a story there. But going 'oh, she wants tax loopholes closed and yet she has someone do her taxes for her who knows tax law' is weak, even from someone who clings to an outdated pseudonym.

Charlotte Church gently pats critics on the head

Whenever a well-off person says they'd rather pay more tax and see better public services, there's an immediate clamour of "why don't you just write a cheque to HMRC, then?"

It happened when Charlotte Church made a call for a more redistributive tax system. But Church is smarter than those who would honk at her. She sighed, and took to Twitter to roll her eyes at them:

I'm disappointed at the vitriol directed my way, if I gave 70% of my earnings to HMRC voluntarily, not only would it not last long as our public services cost 100s of billions to fund but I doubt it would encourage the richest in this country to get a conscience and follow suit. I have no ulterior motives. The injustice and inequality in society that is pushed further by this government makes me as angry as the hulk!

You'd have to be something of an idiot to think you could patronise Charlotte Church.

Could someone please tell Charlotte Church that punitive tax rates fail to raise extra revenues, but damage investment and employment?

— Roger Helmer (@RogerHelmerMEP) June 5, 2015

I think that proves my point.

The way is still open for Ozzy to have a crack at the Parish Council

Metal star to politician isn't a typical career path, but it looks like it might work for 林昶佐 Freddy Lim out of Chthonic.

He's seeking power. In Taiwan. Taking on the Chinese state makes bands who think wearing scary masks on stage is dangerous look a little weak, doesn't it?

But then, Chthonic aren't quite a typical metal band - Freddy Lim has been chair of the Thai branch of Amnesty for a while now; they use traditional Thai instruments in their metal endeavours; and their lyrics have a political aspect to them.

That's like a party political broadcast, that it is.

Oh, and Lim formed his own political party, too. Not in the style of Bez. A proper political party. The New Power Party (I think the echo of Prince is unintentional) has been going a month, and already has persuaded two prominent human rights lawyers to stand under its banner for city elections this year.

Lim is running for the national legislature next year, and his 'not the two party system message' might sound familiar to British ears:

Lim has rejected the traditional bipolarization of the electorate into pan-blue and pan-green camps, saying that such polarization should no longer be considered effective, as Daan, like any other electoral district, is plural in nature.
“Daan is home to a heterogenous population, which includes people like me — a founding member of a minor party — and the Chinese Nationalist Party’s [KMT] Taipei mayoral candidate in last year’s elections Sean Lien (連勝文),” he said.

John Boehner tries some populism

I have no problem with Taylor Swift gifs. I'm not even that worried about John Boehner trying to communicate the latest thinking in Republican circles using Taylor Swift gifs, even though it was done so very, very poorly.

How poorly?

And the president knows full well there’s no blank space in the taxpayers' checkbook.

Yeah, that badly.

The real problem, though: apparently it took two people to produce what would take one Tumblr user one hand and five minutes to cook up.

[It was] Penned by Digital Communications Director Caleb Smith and Deputy Communications Director Mike Ricci.:

It took two Communication Directors to create "12 Taylor Swift GIFs for you," a post published on Speaker John Boehner's website today that uses animated GIFs of the pop musician in a shrewd play for the hearts of teenagers and 20-somethings.

Presumably, Caleb's role was to go 'is this really patronising' and Mike's to go 'nah, all the kids are doing it. Jiffing is the future, my friend. Ooh - hang on, there's some nuance in point six you might want to edit out.'

Bookmarks: REM

If you have 20 minutes to spare, discover why REM's Out Of Time turned wasteful CD packaging into a solid piece of legislation. And what happened to the Longbox format. Pitch, the music podcast, explains all

Shall we check in with Terry Christian?

I wonder what's on the mind of Word presenter, music writer and Dj Terry Christian these days.

Hey, he might be on Twitter. Let's have a look.

Save the NHS and councils100s of millions by making couples have blood test before getting married - stamp out the publically funded horror

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

I'm sorry, what?

And may seem harsh but if couple too genetically close have kid born disabled -make them pay for kid and not tax payer - RT if agree

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

Even just setting aside for a moment the miserable, life-crushing, bean-counting pettiness of these views, let's just look at the practical proposal. At the point that a couple get married, they will be screened to see if the State will provide for their child. If you assume that's desirable, you would also have to believe that no couple ever has sex without being married first. And all this measure would do is make it less likely that people would ever get married.

But let's not worry about the logic too much, because what's important here is Terry Christian suggesting that people be forced to be screened for purity of their bloodline prior to marriage.

I know what you're thinking - that sounds a bit like a particular strain of political thought. But Terry's ahead of you.

I'm a socialist but time we clamped down on paying for child care for kids from incestuous relationships - kinky for your cousin you pay

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

He's a socialist, just one afraid that certain types of relationship might cost the nation money.

But he's a socialist.

He's got the national interest at heart.

I think we can agree on this; it's simply that Terry is some sort of, if you will, National Socialist.

What Terry is talking about here is people with disabilities. Times change, though, and the way we talk about these issues can change; the labels used adapt over time. Perhaps Terry has a phrase rather than "people with disabilities" he'd like to use instead?

@Flexbrowne if we bring in blood tests they won't as less disabilties - no legal marriage if too genetically close = no inbreed kids

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

"Inbreed kids". Yes, that's probably the sensitive term you're after, Terry.

But isn't this all a little, well, political? Especially given that they'd usually get Mark Lamarr to deal with the slightly more thinky bits on The Word?

@LiamElliott92 not about 'politics' about what makes sense in s society - I'm not into waving flags

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

I think there's a pretty big flag waving here, Terry.

No, hang on, he really isn't being political.

Politics -so we all have to be in a box then for you simpletons @LiamElliott92: @terrychristian your politics are arse from elbow at times."

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

It's just your prejudices, reader, that makes this into a political discussion. After all, he's only suggesting that, in order to reduce payments from the state, that the state refuses to sanction marriage and obliges everyone who wishes to get married to have a blood test first. It's not like the government introducing rules like that would be in any way a political act, right?

After a little while, Christian appears to rein back from suggesting blood tests for engaged couples, and attempts to recast his policy in what I think feels is a warmer, more consensual light:

Your kid is disabled - Doctor says its cos you are too close genetically to have more kids - should tax payers pay for your future kids

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

Here he is, meeting people half way - we should only be screening people who already have one child with disabilities and stopping them from having any more. A crowd-pleasing 'first inbreed kid free' policy from Terry, if you like. The man is all heart.

Not everyone disagreed with Christian, though: he found some support, which he retweeted to prove he wasn't some sort of nasty man out of step with decent society:

@thisisamy_ well said @terrychristian

— Stephe Meloy (@Staircase2) April 25, 2014

Oh... hang on a moment...

@Staircase2 @terrychristian @thisisamy_ he meant well said to the girl, not you Terry you inbred twat

— King Charlatan (@kingcharlatan) April 25, 2014

I know what you're thinking: Terry Christian must be totally confident in his data and understanding of the subject to float such a severe-sounding policy. Terry, let's establish your bona fides, shall we?

HND in applied Biology - and you @FrankButcher77: @terrychristian @chriswray2 Really! Learn about genetics etc...You cock."

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

Christian does indeed have an HND in Applied Biology, which he obtained at Thames Poly at the start of the 1980s. His specialism, though, was microbiology rather than genetics. So not entirely relevant, and certainly not current.

But still, it's a start. And presumably he has some up-to-date evidence, too?

Mates daughter is a doctor and mates who work for council @cribbesque: why would this even bother you ? Personal experience maybe?"

— terry christian (@terrychristian) April 25, 2014

If you need any further footnotes, there's sure to be a bloke down the pub who used to date a physical therapist and a woman he met who once played Etty Darwin in a stage play he can call on, too.

Remember, gentle reader: all Terry wants to do is save your tax money from the grubbing fingers of inbreed kids with kinky parents. Is that really any reason to think of him as grubby, greedy, selfish, horrific skein of a man?

Gordon in the morning: Zach off

Pete Samson files from America, with news of a surprising intervention in UK politics:

HOLLYWOOD funnyman Zach Galifianakis has launched a campaign from the US: “Make Boris Johnson Prime Minister.”

Obviously, there's little surprise in Murodch hacks doing their master's bidding by running a story that bolsters his beloved pet toff and adds a bit of showbiz glitz to the anointed one. But Galifianakis actively running a campaign to pull off the difficult trick of getting a safe Tory MP to resign their seat, Boris into parliament, and replacing David Cameron? He must be deeply convinced in the Boris agenda to sign up to that - how much time has he spent studying British politics?

The actor was wowed by the Mayor of London after watching him on David Letterman’s late-night chat show before the Olympics.

That seems a fairly slight base upon which to start a campaign. You... you are sure he's running a campaign, aren't you, Pete?

[F]or the Hangover star there is one bright light shining in the dark world of politics – and that’s Boris and his dazzling blond barnet.

Zach said it would be “amazing” if Boris was made PM. He told The Sun: “He would change the face of what a national leader could be. He’s charming, very funny – and has that weird hair.”

So the "campaign" consists of muttering something about how funny it would be if we landed ourselves with a Prime Minister with unruly hair.

You wouldn't be slightly overselling the story, there, Pete, would you?

Ironically, Newt Gingrich chooses to not face up to the challenge of his rivals

Newt Gingrich has thrown in the legal towel following his unapproved use of Eye Of The Tiger at pep rallies. The Hollywood Reporter, erm, reports:

Sullivan sued Gingrich in January for using his co-written Grammy-winning song as entrance music at various conferences and campaign rallies.

In March and April, when Gingrich's campaign still had some life, the Republican fought back with tough-talking motions in court. Gingrich questioned the jurisdiction, brought up the statute of limitations, pointed to the First Amendment, nodded to the song's other co-writer who stated he was "not on board" the lawsuit, and most importantly, spoke about the blanket license he had gotten from ASCAP that purportedly covered public performance uses associated with political campaigns.

As ever, though, Gringrich blew hard and then caved. Terms haven't yet been made public.

Morrissey goes to the Middle East

Tucked into his grumbling about the Olympics yesterday was also a brief word or two from Morrissey about his recent Tel Aviv tour.

Now, playing a gig in Israel is a highly charged thing for a foreign artist to do. The usual form is for a band to book a date, receive flak for doing so, and then invent a dentist's appointment or a plectrum shortage in order to cancel. (I'm looking at you, Pixies.)

Elvis Costello was acute when he axed his 2010 Israel mini-tour - he said that merely playing there would be "interpreted as a political act", that whatever your motives, whatever your personal beliefs, whatever the make-up of the audience to which you play, it does make you seem a bit ambivalent about what's going on in the occupied territories.

Morrissey is a man who can't talk about taking a stroll down the Old Kent Road without it ending up a years-long legal battle over whether he's racist or not, so he doesn't seem to be the best-placed person to navigate this region of raw emotions and subtle inference.

But he had a go, with Tablet Magazine recording his reasoning:

“There is no point punishing a nation for something that the leader of the country does or says. Look at Syria.”

That seems fair enough, although obviously Israel is a parliamentary democracy and Syria has only just thought of trying adding more than one party to ballot papers, which makes it a little bit different. There's a way for the Israelis to voice their disapproval with their government that isn't open to the people of Syria; it's just most of them don't use it.

But at least he indicates - although not in his usual, forthright, take-no-prisoners, I-say-it-as-I-see-it-Elsie-Tanner style - that there is a problem, that there's something the politicians are up to. But he is here for the people, not those in power. This isn't about fawning over those in power.

Hang about a moment, what was that he said in his statement?

Thank you to the city of Tel-Aviv for granting me the Keys to their city. I just might die with a smile on my face, after all.

Oh.

But maybe it was the citizens who gave him the keys? Do you know, Huffington Post?

The former The Smiths star was in the city for a gig on Saturday and during his visit he was presented with the Key to the City by Mayor Ron Huldai.

Oh.

Still, if there's one saving grace from this, it's that his earlier career slip-ups will have taught Morrissey to avoid going on stage and wrapping himself in a contentious flag sending out mixed and confusing messages in a tinder-dry atmopshere.

Right?

Oh.

Of course, Morrissey couldn't spend very long taking advantage of his new-found freedom to prance around Tel Aviv draped in the Israeli flag, as he had to come back to Britain to warn us about the dangers of cheap patriotism at the Olympics.

Starr's house saved again

After all these years, it looks like a combination of Joe Anderson and Grant Shapps have done what Flo Clucas never could, and saved Ringo Starr's first home.

And actually saved this time, not merely issued some half-asses promise about it being taken down and rebuilt in some ill-defined museum somewhere. It's actually part of a plan to save some of the Victorian terraces in the city which had been due to be demolished, so it goes beyond Beatleabilia in its significance.

Assuming, of course, that this time the promises are genuine and not merely a cheap photo op that won't actually deliver. But, hey, what sort of politician would pull a stunt like that?

John Lydon is fond of Newt

I think we're many years past the point where John Lydon saying warm things about Newt Gingrich has any power to raise more than a murmur, but his reasoning is quite interesting:

I've had great pleasure meeting the likes of Newt Gingrich and having a chat with the fellow on a staircase. I found him completely dishonest and totally likeable, because he doesn't care! He knows what a politician is, and he's a perfect embodiment of one.

Saying anything to keep the log rolling? I wonder why Lydon found such a position to be so understandable, eh?

Jagger slaps Cameron & struts out of Davos

Ah, this morning's lavish coverage of Mick Jagger turning up at Dave and/or Boris' expensive Davos tea party must have thrilled the Number 10 press office.

The grins have probably faded somewhat, as Jagger has pulled out, fuming at being described, for example, as a Tory by Gordon Smart this morning:

The Rolling Stones frontman said: "During my career I have always eschewed party politics and came to Davos as a guest, as I thought it would be stimulating.

"I have always been interested in economics and world events.

"I now find myself being used as a political football and there has been a lot of comment about my political allegiances which are inaccurate.

"I think it's best I decline the invitation to the key event and curtail my visit."

That's pretty much a disendorsement of Cameron, then. Or possibly of Boris. Or probably both.

N'Dour announces run at presidency

Youssou N'Dour has confirmed he'll be standing as a candidate in the Senegalese election.

The BBC News report reminds everybody that he recorded Seven Seconds with Neneh Cherry, although surely in 2012 N'Dour must be better-known than either that single or Neneh Cherry?

Bookmarks - Internet stuff: Protest pop

Fennerpearson offers a thoughtful post about about mixing pop and politics:

Chris’s view was that the pop song – and, to cut a long argument short, [the PJ Harvey album] *is* a pop album – was not the right vehicle to discuss war. Although Chris is a headmaster now, he was once an English teacher, so – impressed by my own improvisation – I riposted with the world war one poets. It transpires, however, that they *agonised* over whether it was appropriate to record the horrors of war in a contrived form.

UKIP about to get knocked down again

I know they're just the BNP, but played for laughs, but who at UKIP thought it would be a good idea to use Chumbawamba as their conference theme song?

Former singer Dunstan Bruce is fuming over the politician's unauthorised use of the pro-anarchy song and admits he will consult lawyers if it continues.

He tells Britain's The Guardian, "This song being used by Ukip is so wrong. I am absolutely appalled that this grubby little organisation are stealing our song to use for their own ends. It's beyond the pale and if they use it again we will consider legal action."

Chumbawamba star Alice Nutter adds, "If ever there was gross misuse of a band's music this is it."

It was Chumbawamba, Farrage. Why would you think that there would be common ground?

Mind you, can you really defend a song about anarchy by going to the courts?