Tuesday 31st July

The Daily mail has decided to become the curmudgeon of all papers and has come out against all things Olympic.  Especially the Opening Ceremony which was actually the only one ever with any humour and self-deprecation in it.  Yes, it was a decidedly personal view which ignored the whole of the usual ‘History of Britain’, the Romans weren’t in it, or the Normans, or even the Anglo-Saxons, and thank goodness Danny Boyle had the good sense to leave out the wretched Henry Eighth, whose importance has been consistently over-emphasised.  He decided to start with the Industrial Revolution, which changed the lives of just about every person now residing here, our own grandparents probably lived a quiet life in agricultural Britain, before the first World War, or were poor and working in some heavy industry like mining or shipbuilding or in a dark squalid mill in the North of England.  So the vision we saw actually resonated with families up and down the land.  The second segment which featured the NHS is obviously the source of most of the Tories ire – because, actually, they hate the NHS, despite Cameron’s recent conversion to it.  Most Tories would love us to be like America where the rich get excellent medical treatment and the poor suffer. Apparently Michael Gove, who is rapidly morphing into a modern day Norman Tebbitt, wanted the script changed, and good old Jeremy Hunt had misgivings (after he had spoken to Rupert?).

The amazing thing is that the polls that were done immediately after the Ceremony showed overwhelming approval.  Because the public may criticise Labour, and will vote them out of office when they feel like it, but do actually appreciate that working people would never have had a decent wage or free education or free schooling if it had been left to the Tories.  And the daily Mail is the mouthpiece of the right wing of the Tory party, so it is hardly surprising they hated it.  But they basically hate multi-culturism and any deviation from the nuclear family, so they were never going to get it anyway.  Actually the fact that they are so anti is great, showed just how good it was, doesn’t it.