Gore Vidal interview

"The media belongs to the big money, and the big money, their candidates, their party, is the Republican Party as now constituted. I'd say if you really want to date the crash of the American system, the American republic, it was in the early '50s, when television suddenly emerged as the central fact of American life. That which was not televised did not exist. Then you have the enormous cost of campaigning, which means every politician who wants to buy TV time has got to sell his ass to somebody. And corporate America is ready to buy."

I enjoy reading Gore Vidal and he was recently interviewed for CityPages. He also appeared on TV last night in "Why we fight" on BBC4 which has been described as the "Thinking man's Fahrenheit 9/11". Here's a radio interview with the producer.

Thomas Duignan

I'm just back from Romsey (near Southampton) where I attended a special service in memory of Thomas Duignan (Diggy's eldest brother) who died on 7 March. Tommy wasn't religious and didn't want a memorial service so the family created its own special service. He was a St Mirin's boy (a Dux) and a life-long Celtic fan - Bournemouth CFC put a message in this week's Celtic View in memory of him. He was a lovely guy and hugely popular. He will be badly missed by family (he leaves a wife and two daughters) and friends. I was priveleged to know him.

Thomas Duignan. Born 8 January 1944. Died 7 March 2005.

State of The Blogosphere

Some interesting stats on the growth of blogs. There are even awards. Pity they didn't have a Best Holiday Blog category.

Most efficient keyboard.

Comic Relief :

Making poverty history is a great thing. But is that comic relief show a great thing? Yes admittedly my children painted their hair we donated money and bought McFly. I will also buy the Peter Kaye/Tony Christie one. He makes me laugh. But I hated all those comperes. I used to like Jonathon Ross on the radio but I'm now going off that. But the rest were the supreme purveyors of tat, even crap. Graham Norton, Davina McCall if there is some rubbish tacky show you can pencil her in, some bloke from big brother and to top it off Chris Evans where did they dredge him up from? Was he owed a favour? I watched about an hour. I don't like Little Britain, in fact it makes me feel a bit sick. Jo likes it and asked me why I didn't. But I said fat blokes on the bog about to get their arse wiped is not funny.
Lets make poverty history but I don't think I can watch it again. Cele(brat)ies with over inflated egos moralising at us all. Just show us the injustice do we need to be entertained (?) before putting our hands in our pockets? Or can we not just raise taxes?

Journey to work

I usually walk to work after putting Eleanor on her school bus. I have had some long bus journeys to work when I worked in Cupar. It is about 25 minutes if you go the straight route. But the bus went round as may villages as it couls so it was about 65 minutes. One village actually had a cow byre in the main road. The first time I didn't believe it. I thought I was half asleep. I did a bit of reading on the bus but i never really enjoed it. I like looking out the window or at the people on the bus. I'm reading a science fiction book by Margaret Atwood . Its excellent. I picked it up by chance in the library.

I don't know how you can be writing the blog whilst travelling on the bus. Also how do you make the web links in the prargraph and with different titles to the web link. I've tried to make a link but it probably won't work.

Journey to work

I'm currently on the bus on my way to work - sitting in a traffic jam on the motorway. The journey from Erskine to Glasgow is 15 miles but can take anything from 30 to 75 minutes depending on the traffic. It's going to be closer to 75 minutes this morning.

I use the time to read. I'm currently reading Who Runs this Place? which explores the people who control the UK. I also scan the Metro newspaper which is usually lying around the bus. It's trash but it keeps me in touch with the Great Unwashed. I see from today's edition that Natasha Kaplinski has won Newscaster of the Year. Now Natashi is many things but a great newscaster is not one of them.

Most of the people on the bus sleep, stare out of the window, read pulp fiction or chat. Given the usual topics of conversation (TV, horoscopes, diets etc.), it might be better if they read. The young man sitting opposite me is reading Zoo. The story that he's reading is headlined: "Being shot isn't a big deal". Maybe they should just sleep.