Today, Sepp Blatter will be re-elected as FIFA President. That is all kinds of wrong. As this video aptly demonstrates.
Tag: election
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7 Reasons That The BBC Election Night Coverage Was Weird
1. Fiona Bruce. Bizarrely, for their election special, the BBC decided to segregate the sexes, with the men downstairs and the women upstairs. Queen of the woman-zone was – of course – Fiona Bruce. She was obviously so determined to be seen as the prettiest of them all that she appeared to be wearing all of the make-up. I don’t just mean foundation, concealer, blusher and mascara (I have just reached the limit of my make-up vocabulary), I mean the BBC make-up department’s entire stock of everything. It was extraordinary. Her face appeared to be entombed in concrete. She’s noted for being calm and cool, but if she’d become hysterical during the broadcast it wouldn’t have become apparent until next Wednesday. They’re probably still trying to excavate her chin now.
2. Dimbleby. Down in the man-area David Dimbleby was firmly in command. Seated at the big table, he exuded authority and unflappable professionalism. Of course, there’s no reason that he shouldn’t have, he’s been covering elections since Gladstone was in power. I checked Wikipedia on election night to find out Dimble’s age and discovered that he is a hundred and fifty-four, and that he is immortal. Thanks Wikipedia.
The iMonolith. It's very perceptive. 3. 2010: A Geek Odyssey. Also upstairs in the woman-zone was Emily Maitlis. She was in possession of some extraordinary equipment; she had something that looked like a giant iPad (an iPad Maxi, perhaps). I wondered at first if it was a regular sized one and they’d shrunk Emily Maitlis, but that turned out not to be the case. It looked familiar, but I couldn’t quite work out why. Then it struck me. It was like a cross between an iPad and the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Presumably across the nation, Apple-obsessed-geeks were gazing in awe at the iMonolith, drooling, and thinking “I want one”. That was pretty much what I was doing too, though I wasn’t looking at the iMonolith.
4. Tradition. One of the best election night traditions that the viewer can participate in is the time-honoured custom of being aggravated by the ridiculous and vapid CGI effects that Jeremy Vine uses to illustrate election night events. Appearing baffled, rolling your eyes and criticising the stupidity of the CGI is the viewer’s traditional role on election night – it’s like being Paxman – but this year, something strange happened. I understood all of the graphics; I wasn’t annoyed by them; I didn’t feel patronised by them; in fact, they were quite good. I don’t pay my licence fee to not be annoyed by the election night graphics. It is my right. Next time, I expect them to spend more money on them and make them as vast, preposterous and inscrutable as usual.
5. Paxman. The third inhabitant of the woman-zone was everybody’s favourite pantomime dame, Jeremy Paxman. My god he was furious. Perhaps he was cross because he’d been put upstairs with the ladies away from the big table, or perhaps it was because Dimbleby refuses to die. Whatever the reason, he was angry, short-tempered and petulant throughout the broadcast. It’s a shame to see that a once fine broadcaster has become such a parody of himself. Even having two laptops wasn’t enough to placate him. He looked like a man who didn’t want to be there and I hope he gets his wish.
6. The Luvvie Boat. To cover an election that the Tories (who have promised to slash the BBC budget) were widely expected to win, the BBC chose to spend a vast amount of money giving free booze to celebrities on a swanky boat moored on the Thames. They’re obviously idiots. Captaining the good ship Lollygag was Andrew Neil, a man so creepy that spiders shriek and stand on chairs when they encounter him. It was Neil’s job to elicit the opinions of drunken celebs on the election and in this he was successful. Unfortunately, as is often the case after a lot of drink has been taken, the views being expressed were not as coherent and insightful as they might otherwise have been. Probably the best slurrer of the evening was Kirsty Allsop. I can’t remember exactly what point she was trying to make, and she probably can’t either. The soberest person on the boat appeared to be Bruce Forsyth, but his opinion wasn’t helpful either because he’s clearly mad. There is nothing in the world that can be improved by knowing Brucie’s opinion on it. Nothing.
7. The Result. We’re still waiting for the result, it’s been four days! Hurry up.
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Election Special: 7 Reasons I Managed To Stay Up All Night
Yesterday, there was a general election. You may have noticed. The results came in over night. I was there. Throughout. This is how I did it.
10:00pm. So we have an Exit Poll – which it turns out is very different from an exit pole. It’s going to be Hung Parliament time. I can hardly contain myself. So I don’t and have a biscuit. Ten minutes into the programme and the BBC have a screen fail. Unfortunately, there was no screen fail while Dorothy was walking along the Yellow Brick Road. Or was it Jeremy Vine bouncing down Downing Street? Who cares. The BBC try and talk to Michael Gove. He’s mute. I don’t blame him. Jeremy Paxman is asking silly questions. Oh no, Gove has stopped being mute. And worse luck, so has Harriet Harman. I note her choice of nose this evening. I’m not sure why I note it, but I do. Some twats in Sunderland seem to think they are on Record Breakers. Tossers.
11.00pm. The first hour wasn’t too bad. I feel relatively fresh. Mind you, I am not usually in bed by this time anyway. Not that I need to share my bedroom habits with you. And I hope you don’t want to share yours with me. (But if you do we have an email address: [email protected]). I’ve got the munchies now. My fridge shouts sausages at me. Not literally. That would wake the neighbours. I ignore them anyway. Another biscuit. Labour are winning 1-0-0-0 by the way. Jeremy Vine is playing virtual dominoes. Esther Rantzen is on my screen. It brings back memories of Hearts Of Gold. In the meantime, Fiona Bruce seems to be finding everything absolutely hilarious. I don’t know why. This is boring.
Midnight. And we are into a new day. The day we get a new government. Or not. Ken Clarke just made me giggle. Some sly comment about Paxman cutting away from him to show Gordon Brown arrive at his count. David Cameron has gone to the pub. It’s 00:33. Late license? Blimey I need a drink. Stricnine ideally. Only three seats in so far. Why is it so slow? Eyelids beginning to feel a little heavy now. David Dimbleby is angry. Very angry. It’s a scandal apparently. I think he’s talking about people getting turned away from polling stations, but I am distracted by thoughts of him in the boardroom. Not in a dirty way. In a Sir Alan Sugar getting annoyed with the candidates way. I wonder what Sir Alan Sugar is doing tonight. Subbuteo is my guess. I used to love that game. Time for another biscuit.
1:00am. The Tories still haven’t won a seat, but boy they’re swinging hard. Mind you the Baltimore Orioles swing hard every year and look where that has got them in the AL East. I’m talking about baseball now. How did that happen? Oh yes, I was thinking about swinging. Cameron just stroked his wife’s bottom. Nice touch. I feel drunk. Which is odd considering I haven’t had a drink since Saturday night. I think I need to start now though. Twenty-three seats declared. David Blunkett has admitted defeat. I think he has fired off a bit too early to be honest. But as the camera won’t pan downwards, I’ll never be able to confirm this.
2:00am. And we’ve made it to 2am. The Tories have won some seats, Labour have won some more seats and the Lib Dems appear to be going backwards. Which is odd. Nick Robinson agrees with me. It is odd. But enough of this election nonsense, I am back on the tea. Not that I ever really left it. It’s just been a while since my last cup. Like forty minutes. Now I’m having a look at Twitter. There is a lot of hate out there isn’t there? My political views – and they are mainstream – make me anything ranging from a ‘deluded prick’ to a ****. I chuckle to myself heartily. The Sex Education Show is on Channel 4. I’m not watching it, I just pressed guide to see what else was on. Now someone’s talking Welsh. What’s the point?
3:00am. My freeview box wants to do a daily service update. Cameron wants to talk. Seeing as I watched Brown do his speech after he held on to his seat, I’ll give Cameron his moment. He doesn’t seem to know what he’s talking about though. Fair enough, he hasn’t been to sleep for months. We’ve got a race to the first hundred on now. It’s neck and neck. Not anymore it’s not… oh, yes it is! No, it’s not! Yes, it is! I’m doing Murray Walker impressions. And The Tories win, win, win! Well that was fun. That’s kept me going for the last thirty-minutes. Now I’m screwed. I’m not going to survive another hour before we get to 200. Fiona Bruce is still high I see.
4:00am. And now I enter my 7th hour. Nick Clegg holds on to his seat. But he doesn’t look too happy. Maybe someone ate his Mars bar. That is just about the worst feeling ever. I have a headache now. Sleep deprivation beginning to bite. And now it’s raining. I wonder if the Tories need less seats under the Duckworth-Lewis system? I ask Marc. He doesn’t know. His cat thinks he knows though. Marc has been talking to his cat. I wish I had a cat. Would be so much more interesting than talking to myself. It’s definitely going to be a hung parliament then. In that case I’m going to bed. I leave the situation standing at 224-167-36-26. It’s been fun. No, actually, it hasn’t.
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Election Special: 7 Reasons It’s Important To Vote Today
7Reasons.org is avowedly apolitical, but the 7 Reasons team are not. As individuals, the 7 Reasons team concur on some things politically – the colossal importance of Sussex in the world order and subsidies for internet humourists are two of them – and differ on other things. So when we go and vote today, we’ll probably vote differently: That’s a good thing, we live in a democracy. The important thing is that we’re voting: Here’s why.
1. Local Issues. Never mind the fatuous faux-presidential debates featuring Smug, Clunking and Irrelevant, you won’t be able to vote for – or against – any of them anyway (unless you live in Witney, Kircaldy and Cowdenbeath or Sheffield Hallam, that is). You’ll be voting for the person that you feel can best represent your interests, both locally and nationally; the person you think can pressure your local council into mending pot-holes or providing stocks for people that park in cycle lanes (I’m still waiting for a reply to that letter), because that’s pretty much what your only contact with your elected representatives will be. You don’t decide who’s going to be Prime Minister, the parliamentary representatives of the majority party do that, but you can decide who represents you and your interests there.
2. Expenses. The parliamentary expenses scandal showed us that there’s serious cross-party corruption in Parliament. If the incumbent of your local seat came out of the expenses scandal badly, this is your chance to remove them from office. Even if you don’t care about politics, you should surely care about integrity; and how many more duck houses and moats do you want to pay for? I’ve always wanted an orangery by the way, if anyone’s buying.
3. Complaint. If you don’t vote then you can’t complain about things afterwards. I haven’t met a British person that can go for five hours without complaining about something, let alone five years. If you have to go that long without complaining you’ll probably explode, or perhaps you’ll find an inner serenity and be elected the new Dalai Lama. Either way, not complaining is uncharted territory and it’s probably dangerous.
4. Other Countries. In the 2005 general election the turnout was 61.3%, which means that 38.7% of people that were eligible to vote didn’t do so. Okay, some of those abstainers probably had good reasons – illness, unforeseen events etc. – but that’s still quite a shameful figure, and if you don’t vote, you shame the nation. After all, if North Korea can get an electoral turnout of nearly 100% then so can we. Or perhaps that’s a bad example. But elections are infrequent in the U.K. and it really isn’t too much trouble to go out and vote. It’s not like we live in Switzerland where they have to vote (on average) seven times per year. Voting’s not difficult and you don’t have to do it often – it’s much like washing a duvet.*
5. See A School. When was the last time you were inside a school? If you’re old enough to vote then you’re too old to attend one. Election day is the only day when many grown-ups can turn up at schools without being asked to leave. Our local school has a hopscotch court painted onto the playground, which is a great place to play while you contemplate how to vote.
6. Change. All of the main parties have told us – many times during this campaign – that a vote for them is a vote for change. I love the idea of being paid for my vote and I’m going to put my change toward a tiramisu. Or a wok. No, a tiramisu. Definitely.
7. Sacrifice. Many, many brave and noble people laid down their lives and sacrificed a great deal so that they – and we – would be able to live in a democracy. We only finished paying off the Americans for the Second World War in December 2006, so most people eligible to vote today have made sacrifices too. We dishonour the efforts of many people by not voting. Also, if we don’t exercise our democratic right to vote, we leave others to dictate policy to us and by our apathy, we impose dictatorship on ourselves. Second World War propagandists would have probably put it like this.
*I’m wrong. It’s way easier to vote than it is to wash a duvet, or even to carry one of the blasted things: You need arms like Mr Tickle.