Bashing Gordon
Sir: Poor, poor Gordon. Have mercy! We brutish Scots must stick together; if I had the likes of Bob Ainsworth, not to mention the simpering fraudsters of ‘Blair’s babes’, in my office every day, I would be sorely tempted to reach for the birch — if not a cricket bat.
Then, of course, some closer to the headmaster might not be averse to a little S&M. But now that old protester-puncher Prescott has come out in support. Really, who needs friends like that?
Alistair Horne
Henley-on-Thames
Time for a tea party
Sir: You are right when discussing MPs’ and BBC expenses to bring in the question of local authorities’ expenses (Leading article, 12 February). But there is no point whingeing about council taxes unless taxpayers start doing something about it. In East Herts, grassroots activity, including a public meeting and local press coverage, has resulted in the local Independent Remuneration Panel recommending substantial reductions in councillors’ special responsibility allowances. The tea-party movement is growing in the United States; the same must start happening throughout this country.
And then we can start to tackle Brussels.
Christopher Taylor-Young
Widford, Herts
In praise of Curtis
Sir: I have rarely been so incensed with an item in your fabulous magazine. Stephen Pollard (‘Stick to making your schmaltzy films, Mr Curtis’, 20 February) is so wrong. Richard Curtis brings good where there is bad. His films are brilliant because they remind us of how frail we all are. Of course he exaggerates to make a point, but his characters and situations do exist.
And as for the Robin Hood Tax… Curtis has again touched a nerve. Unless I have turned overnight into one of the rose-tinted, upper-middle class parodies that Pollard insults, this is how we all feel, and thousands want to do something about it.
More from Richard Curtis, and no more from Mr Pollard, please.
Alex Field
Edinburgh
Sir: At least when I disagree with what Rod Liddle has to say (I despair that this is becoming less and less of an occurrence), I know I’m on dangerous ground, for his arguments are both eloquent and witty. It reassures me that when reading Stephen Pollard on Richard Curtis, I know I can still recognise subjective, emotive nonsense when I see it.
As a trustee of Comic Relief, I suppose I have an advantage in that I know Richard Curtis, but in truth, not very well, which allows me to write without any hidden agenda. (I’m not sure the same can be said of Mr Pollard.) Our trustee meetings are extremely well governed, objective and highly professional. They’re run by an outstanding chairman — not by Richard — and I’ve not once encountered anything approaching a political agenda. Your best writers write, they don’t rant. Double helpings of Rod next week please.
Jim Hytner
Coleshill, Bucks
Post-normal
Sir: There is an amusing coincidence about James Delingpole’s article (‘You know it makes sense’, 20 February) on the iniquities of post-normal science as the source of global-warming science. Just as he was preparing his piece in which I am identified as the evil genius who invented the doctrine, I was posting an essay on a prominent sceptical blogsite, www.wattsupwiththat.com. There I congratulated the critics of AGW as a new ‘extended peer community’, bringing real quality control to the climate debate in this post-normal situation.
Copied to other sites, and followed by a short piece in the Guardian (online), this essay attracted over 500 comments, fairly evenly split. Incidentally, although this sort of thing really shouldn’t matter any more, I should say that I had settled my views on Marxism a couple of decades before embarking on post-normal science.
Jerome R. Ravetz
Oxford
Sides of the rainbow
Sir: In his article pouring scorn on the various ‘colour revolutions’ across Eastern Europe (‘The end of the rainbow’, 12 February), John Laughland appears to have totally missed the point of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution. The Orange Revolution was not about putting a particular leader into power, it was about ensuring that Ukraine embraced some basic democratic standards and did not slide into the state authoritarianism of Putin’s Russia.
Ukraine now has a vigorous (if fractious) democracy, a lively free press that takes a keen interest in what its political leaders are up to, and has just fought a closely contested election that, according to most observers, was conducted fairly. That is not a defeat for the Orange Revolution — it is a success.
John Bourn
Gateshead
Classically trained
Sir: Philip Hensher (Books, 6 February) rightly draws attention to the impossibility of writing about classical music for a generation largely unable to read music, and lacking any education in the subject. He does not seem to have considered any possible solution to this problem.
Surely there is a need, and a large potential market, for an educational series of recordings, starting from very basic first principles and progressing to more advanced examples and analyses. Has anything similar been attempted since Britten’s ever-popular Young Person’s Guide?
Classical music must not be allowed to die because of the rather snobbish assumption that it can only be appreciated by those who have been fortunate enough to have learned to read music and play an instrument at school. I see that even Radio 3 is losing heart, and has just featured ‘Bebop’ as its Composer of the Week.
Michael Bartlett
By email
Mutual content
Sir: I am infuriated that Dominic Prince has let the cat out of the bag concerning NFU (‘Mutual Satisfaction’, 13 February). I too have enjoyed the intelligent human contact, the amazing premiums, and the efficient service from both Wareham and Wimborne branches of NFU Mutual. I was trying to keep this to myself, as to tell the world will surely spoil this beacon of old-fashioned values.
Ian Ventham
Dorset
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