Good morrow lemmings and welcome to Finchlayyyy, Maggie T’s old seat! Since I imagine you’re all eager to squabble over this edition in a manner that would make Officer Dimble piteously appeal for calm, let’s – to quote Monty Python and the Holy Grail – GET ON WITH IT.
Get thee to Monaco
Tristram ‘bread loaf face’ Hunt hasn’t had a very good week, and it’s about to get worse. It seems that he simply cannot keep his mouth shut and prevent his foot from getting jammed up in there. The first question is clearly not loaded at all: is Labour ‘Billy No-Mates’ when it comes to business-type chums? Christina Odone, representing the thinky-tank wing of a private investment firm, is first out the gate ‘n’ ready to hate. She licks the milky teat of business, praising this vague concept (business! As in, all business ever! No distinction between the types or individual examples of business, just…business, innit?) out the wazoo. Jonathan Freedland, from the Grauniad, who looks like every geography teacher to ever live rolled into one human being, thinks Labour has…some mates. A few. For some unknowable reason. Like the weird kid in your class at school who eats glue.
Then Nicky Morgan, the Education Secretary who surprisingly isn’t Michael Gove (although denies that he’s still sitting in her office with his feet up watching Game of Thrones) trots out the party line in a predictable and boring fashion. “There’s a clear choice -” is her very first sentence, and I automatically fall asleep. Her eyes are big and staring, like a squid. She and Christina also seem to perform an effective double act, acting as twins to jab Tristram in the face some more.
Anyway, let’s see what he has to say for himself. Breadhead rambles on about productivity, and George Galloway’s face visibly twitches. “I have a rather old-fashioned view about this! Call me old-fashioned but that’s my view!!” Tristram says, and I just know – with joy in my heart – that he’s about to go into a historical lecture, and sure enough he brings up the (of course!) American Revolution. Nicky Morgan looks confused and repulsed, but Tristram’s inherent nerdiness is my favourite thing about him. He may be useless when it comes to everything else, but he’d probably be a good history teacher so long as his students didn’t gang up and pelt him with paper aeroplanes because I feel like he would be very easily overwhelmed in that situation.
Fig. 1
Then everyone gets into a kerfuffle about why the heating is off. This is extreme drama. It’s broken, assures Dimbles, but George ‘Top Cat’ Galloway, who has been wearing some fetching hipster glasses up until now, assures us that it is all a conspurracy.
Turn to page 394
Next question: aren’t zero-hours contracts terrible? I imagined, at first, that this would be a dull question with everybody agreeing with each other. However then I bear witness to the merry sight of Tristram getting annihilated by a man in the audience who is literally laughing himself to death over prissy Trissy’s hypocrissy. I’m sure many adulatory Tory Twitter graphics have been made about him by now. Go look it up, I’m too lazy to.
Then it happens again. And again. And again. Tristram looks constipated. Blimey, Finchley is pretty anti-Labour. Who would have thunk it! (Meanwhile, is it just me or have Tristram’s vocal inflections, when he speaks slower, begun to sometimes sound like William Hague?)
This is all due to Tony Blair and Gordon Brown being bum-kissers, concludes George…cattily.
Next up, is David Cameron right to say skewls are mediocre? ‘lmao ya lol’ says Nicky, like it’s her job or something. Schools can apparently be mediocre and amazingly improved at the same time! Wow! It’s all thanks to Michael Gove. Tristram, whose job is to dispute this, assure us that Nicky is wrong…because…uh. Dimbles asks him what his plan is. Tristram says to give it two weeks, with a nod, wink and a nose tap. The audience aren’t pleased with this and begin to heckle like they’ve never heckled before (it’s only going to get worse from here, folks!). Confused and frightened and chewing his lip into fleshy ribbons, the Yeast Beast starts lashing out at anyone and everything, even going so far as to tut about Christina’s nun-too-shabby education. You know, by nuns. This has caused mass Twitter outrage which is a phrase I use in these reviews depressingly often.
(Also, Nicky Morgan, I know he’s embarrassing but please stop tutting and moaning. It’s annoying. More annoying than squarebonce himself.)
And we will build Jerusalem
Finally, a question that will no doubt be answered with the respect and sensitivity it deserves. Why is antisemitism rising in the UK, and does a ~*~CERTAIN MEMBER~*~ of the panel bear some responsibility? Audible ‘ooooh’s abound.
A tense argument erupts tensely. Jonathan Freedland says that…occasionally…just sometimes…GG can be a teensy bit inflammatory. Galloway inflammatorily responds and compares himself to Daniel among the lions. Is that really the best comparison to make? Then things descend into chaos. People are screaming and possibly wetting themselves. Dimbleby has to scold them to quieten down. This isn’t helped by Galloway claiming that he’s being oppressed and recoiling in horror from Christina Odone attempting to tussle with him. “Take your hands off me!” he snaps, like an offended medieval maiden confronted by a leper. Are you feline okay, George?
At least Tristram somewhat redeems himself with a good answer to the last question, sensibly pointing out that it’s perhaps not the best idea to blame innocent people living thousands of miles away for the actions of an ultra right-wing government. Galloway has certainly not redeemed himself (if this is how he defends himself from accusations of being an antisemite, then I don’t know how he’d react to people pointing out his creepy comments on rape), but regardless I don’t like the sour note this programme has ended on, e.g. with that one guy implying that Muslims are routinely going around whacking Jewish people with baseball bats – white Neo-Nazi groups are also growing at worrying rates. Pitting Jewish and Muslim people against each other for televisual sport just doesn’t sit well with me.
I need a stiff drink. Time for the scores.
Morgan: 5/10
(Trod) Water
Hunt: 3/10
Slaughtered
Galloway: 3/10
(Ooh, says the crowd, what a) Rotter (Rawter? idk)
Odone: 5/10
(Would rather be on a) Yacht(…er)
Freedland: 7/10
Sorta (okay I guess)
The Crowd: 8/10
Shorter (tempers then most crowds)
Next time…something. More importantly, don’t forget to check out Noobminster, Ye Olde Webmastre’s new, cool, newcool webzone! Or I’ll ‘ave yer.
Next week Lemmings, next week…
