Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Is it more rude to ask if someone’s going whacko than blind?

Rod Liddle says the furore surrounding Andrew Marr’s questions to Gordon Brown is academic. These rumours are rife in the blogosphere

issue 03 October 2009

Rod Liddle says the furore surrounding Andrew Marr’s questions to Gordon Brown is academic. These rumours are rife in the blogosphere

Is our Prime Minister perpetually out of his brainbox on powerful psychotropic substances, as everybody now seems to believe? Dilaudid, crystal meth, that sort of thing? Does he stagger out of bed and say: ‘Aw, Sarah, I’ve got a meeting with Harman in half an hour. Light up the crack pipe, will you?’

Looking at the man, you would not think so. That strange, strangulated smile, the ever encroaching brow — this is not the demeanour of a man who, for example, mainlines camel tranquillisers every morning. If he is scoring regularly, then I suggest he changes his dealer, because he’s being ripped off. Mandelson, meanwhile — well, there’s another issue.

The BBC’s Andrew Marr is in a spot of bother because he asked Gordon Brown straight out if he was a druggy, having already asked him if he were about to go blind.

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