This post has been split so that if you want to follow both LiveChats at the same time you can easily open the two posts in two different windows and put them alongside each other.
Cunning thinking, eh?
This Scottish-oriented Chat is being hosted and moderated by Subrosa although you can’t escape the grim glare of TheEye’s moderating touch here either.
Many thanks to MaxFarquar for the two excellent logos we’ve used here tonight.
And so we wake up this morning to news that Osama bin Laden is dead. Countless trees will die as newspapers bring us details and analysis but the BBCs instant reaction has been interesting – especially as they’ve had 9 years, 7 months and 21 days to prepare.
The BBC has a rolling obituary which better suits a head of state or great friend of the world which is…typical. Take this sentence as an example:
“‘To his supporters, Bin Laden was a fighter for freedom against the US and Israel, not, as he was to many in the West, a terrorist with the blood of thousands of people on his hands.‘”
One clip ends with the statement that ‘his ideas live on‘ solemnly intoned over a photograph of him smiling into the camera like a happy, bearded uncle.
As usual on Thursday we’ll be bringing you the Question Time LiveChat session. But as it’s also Local Election results night we’re going to extend the chat to cover that as well.
So we’ll start at 10:30pm as usual and finish up whenever the last wibbling drunk can’t type any longer.
The AV Referendum count won’t be happening until the next day because they haven’t yet bought the voting machines that the utterly dishonest Electoral Reform Society claim not to be selling. But there will still be plenty of AV uninformed speculation and pointless rehashing of lies for us to pick over like the dregs of a goat curry.
As we’re covering the elections, we’ll be spreading the chat live across Biased-BBC, AllSeeingEye, MaxFarquar and a few others to be finalised. Thanks go to Max for the excellent logo designed for the night.
At some time during the night we should be celebrating our very own David Vance‘s election as a NI Assembly member so keep the champagne chilled for that moment.
See you all here on Thursday night…
Question Time tonight comes from that famous bastion of middle-of-the-road politics…Liverpool.
On the panel tonight we have Baron and part time vampire Michael Howard, adulterer, windmill fanatic and expenses fiddler* Chris Huhne, Pantone #1235 (Saffron) coloured bank robber Peter Hain, Alex Wee Eck Salmond and former New Statesman deputy editor Cristina Odone.
*As a bit of random trivia, Huhne claimed £85.35 on expenses for having a picture of himself framed and inscribed.
Those hoping for a double-bill of idiocy will be disappointed – there is no This Week this week.
Your long-suffering brace of Moderators; TheEye and David Mosque, will be tilting at windmills here from 10:30pm.
Question Time tonight comes from Oxford.
On the panel tonight we have Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport Jeremy Hunt MP, Caroline “female window dressing” Flint MP, Jo Swinson MP, Labour “Lord” Robert Winston and gay luvvie Simon Callow.
The LiveBlog will also cover the demented This Week, with Andrew Neil, Michael Portillo and Jacqui Smith – with guests David Schneider and Jay Rayner, and the round-up from BBC Deputy Political Editor James Landale.
Your cheerful brace of Moderators; TheEye and David Mosque, will be looking to keep order here from 10:30pm.
Question Time tonight comes from London.
At the time of writing this (approx 7pm) confirmed panelists according to the BBC Question Time website are Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, Sarah Teather MP, Diane Abbott MP and the regularly tedious Clive Anderson. It’s unclear whether an extra panelist is yet to be confirmed, whether Abbott is vast enough to count as two people, or whether she’s already eaten the unlucky 5th chair z-list celeb.
Perhaps Abbott and Teather are supposed to average out?
UPDATE: Thanks to the ever-alert Clameur de Haro for updating us that mouth-breathing trade union parasite Mark Serwotka will be on the panel too. *sigh*
The LiveBlog will also cover the insane This Week, with Andrew Neil, Michael Portillo, a random lefty politician and an unbranded 6-pack of hangers-on.
Your cheerful brace of Moderators; TheEye and David Mosque, will be looking menacing here from 10:30pm.
Question Time tonight comes from London.
On the panel we have ex-spook and future Foreign Secretary Rory Stewart MP, the “ginger rodent” Danny Alexander MP, newt-loving nutter Ken Livingstone, rocker-druggie Mick’s ex-wife Bianca Jagger and historian Niall Ferguson.
Red Ken on tonight, eh? Doubtless Boris will be on next week for Mayoral election balance? No, thought not. On a positive note, though, QT will follow a Party Budget Broadcast by Red Ed which should cost him a couple of points in the polls.
The LiveBlog will also cover the insane This Week, with Andrew Neil, Michael Portillo, a random lefty politician and a veritable smorgasbord of hangers-on. Let’s see if they can top the owl-eyed and off-her-face fashion designer from last week who mumbled some disconnected views about nuclear power.
TheEye and David Mosque will be cutting fuel tax here from 10:30pm.
Question Time tonight comes from Eastbourne, which boasts of being the sunniest place in Britain based only on a freak statistic from 1911 and is the location of the third most popular suicide spot in the UK. The ashes of Frederick Engels were scattered there upon his death. Marvellous.
On the panel tonight we have…well, it’s just surreal. Question Time’s favourite minority box-ticker Baroness Warsi, the Labour guy who posed in a gay contacts magazine in his Y-fronts Chris Bryant, Bermondsey by-election “The Straight Choice” against Peter Tatchell – and who later turned out to be anything but straight; Simon Hughes, and eco-fascist Caroline Lucas. Kelvin MacKenzie occupies the lone chair of reality.
This LiveBlog doesn’t promise any improvement afterwards when the grim horror of This Week is lanced like an exploding corpulent pustule of stupidity all over our screens. Two washed up politicians, Andrew Neil and a surreal collection of F-List wannabes and never-will-be bores will escort the live-chat into the night.
Moderators TheEye and David Mosque will be sobbing quietly into their absinthe here from 10:30pm.
Question Time tonight comes from Edinburgh.
On the panel we have Leader of the Scottish Conservatives Annabel Goldie MSP, SecofState for Scotland and LibDem Michael Moore MP, Labour’s Wee Dougie Alexander MP, Green Party MSP and painfully right-on Patrick Harvie, and the SNPs Nicola Sturgeon MSP. Londoner Nick Ferrari is the final panelist despite his only apparent connection to Scotland being appearing with Sean Connery as an extra in Octopussy.
As we’re coming from Scotland for those playing the Buzzword Bingo we’ll be using the Caledonian Rules. Therefore rude references to Fatcha and NorthSeaOil are not on the Bingo cards tonight but will instead be weighed and points awarded accordingly. Attempts to make Gordoom look anything other than a disaster are worth 10 points apiece. The Hutton Report is your Joker tonight, and you’ll want to double it up with Brown’s Pension Raid, Final Salary, Retirement Age and Sending Kids Up Chimneys depending on the panelist. Independence will only score points if on the same line as Barnett or diagonal to Trident Hypocrisy.
The LiveBlog will also cover the insane This Week with Andrew Neil, two washed up politicians and a surreal collection of F-List wannabes and never-will-be bores.
TheEye and David Mosque will be operating a no-fly zone here from 10:30pm.
Question Time tonight, on the day of the Barnsley by-election, comes from Derby.
On the panel we have Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith MP. Fresh from her recent victory over Cathy Ashton in the regional heats of International Face Like A Horse, there is the local Labour MP and former foreign secretary (really) Margaret Beckett. Also former Labour minister ‘Lord’ Malloch Brown, historian David Starkey and economist and journalist Liam Halligan.
For those playing the Buzzword Bingo we’ll be using the Pointless Voting Rules. Voting will be just about over in the Welsh Referendum to change the way the Assembly votes on…zzzzzzzzzzz *snore* and Barnsley will be voting in Mugabesque percentages for a lamppost with a red rosette on it. That leaves us open to Thatcher, Miners, and Doom. All three on your card and in the same sentence wins 100 points and a B-BBC coffee cup.
LibDem Meltdown and UKIP or BNP Surge also score tonight, with double points if used in an attack on the Coalition. Defence Cuts make a predicable return to the Bingo card this week, although Sea Harriers Scrapped by Labour in 2004 isn’t on your card as it won’t be mentioned. Play your Libya Chaos joker quickly for bonus hidden prizes.
The LiveBlog will also cover the insane This Week, with Andrew Neil, Michael Portillo, a random lefty politician (probably Jacqui Smith now that the inconvenient expenses theft fraud lies stuff has been airbrushed out of history) and a collection of X-Factor rejects.
TheEye and David Mosque will be operating a no-fly zone here from 10:30pm.
