I was going to write a post about the recent appointments at the top of the EU, but I’m just going to post this video of Andrew Neil instead:
This is brilliant. “How can Europe be safe in these people’s hands?”.
Andrew Neil destroys a pro-EU journalist’s attempts to defend the disastrously bad appointments of new EU officials. Brutal, but hugely watchable….Neil at his best. pic.twitter.com/AmBBRuZCBW
— Voice of Reason (@brexitblog_info) July 5, 2019
Andrew Neil is about the only senior journalist left in Britain capable of asking the right questions about those who would rule over us.
Grillo pad?
Indeed, he may well be the last one.
Ask proper questions in a proper manner and the sheer paucity of argument and rhetorical ability of these people is starkly laid bare.
I don’t know about anybody else but that it what I find most frightening. The sheer scope and range of their inability.
Andrew Neil is about the only journalist capable. …. whch is precisely why he’s being axed
Sigh! There he goes, trying to muddy the waters with facts when, as the woman at the right of the screen rightly said “Well, that is an opinion …”.
He’s a dinosaur that hasn’t realised that feelz trump facts every time. Get rid of him!
(The internet really, REALLY needs a sarcasm font).
“Well, that is an opinion …”
Indeed, Christine Lagarde’s criminal conviction is a matter of opinion, apparently. It must be nice to be one of the ruling class.
Julia Hartley-Brewer is also good news as an interviewer although she doesn’t have a research team which is I imagine how Andrew Neil always appears to have awkward facts to throw at his interview subjects.
Sure, but the EU is such a corrupt organisation that any Europhiles / Remoaners that turn up are essentially attempting to defend the indefensible. It’s a bit like shooting fish in a barrel.
The only correct response to the appointment of the current crop of EU presidents is to admit that they are political failures looking for a bit of ready cash and a nice sinecure to take them through to retirement.
Nobody *WANTS* to be EU president, they’d far rather be PM at home (whether that is Germany or Luxembourg), so that they can lord it over their school mates.
The only reason you join the EU gravy train is if your domestic political career is in tatters or (like Donald Tusk), you’re fleeing a domestic legal challenge that might put you in jail for a few years and getting that EU sinecure with its legal protection might just buy you time to get away with it.
The current EU presidents have the same basic characteristics of previous ones
Nigel Farage insults Herman van Rompuy, calls EU President a “DAMP RAG”
Can we leave yet?
Isn’t being fourth-rate one of the criteria? The EU’s leaders don’t want EU Presidents throwing their weight around and attempting to lead.
Maybe, however, we’re all speaking too soon. Juncker’s replacement was due to be the leader of the biggest group in the EU parliament. They even had a “lead candidate debate” (for which I’d love to see the viewing figures).
Maybe the MEP’s will assert themselves and insist on their nominee?
What? You mean “Our Nige?”
Now that would be funny. Like Oliver Cromwell dismissing the Rump Parliament type funny.
TMB
“………….which is I imagine how Andrew Neil always appears to have awkward facts…….”
To be fair to Brillo, he actually has a good analytical brain, does his research and, unlike pretty much every journalist, is good with numbers, economics and finance.
Recusant
Absolutely. Not only does he have the facts at his fingertips, he is extremely fleet of foot in spotting the flaws in his interlocutor’s responses and challenging them.
My point, such as it was, is merely that he is a sufficiently senior newsman to be able to command the sort of research support that allows him to collate and reel off facts (as here with the percentages of airworthy planes, seaworthy submarines and broomsticks for rifles) which torpedo the guest’s position.
“What? You mean “Our Nige?””
No, the EPP, the Nige Insurgency being very much not part of the plan.
You surely remember Martin Weber winning the EU election? No? You know, good old Martin?
Brillo is out on his own as the only (senior) journalist capable of asking the right questions.
Emily tries but misunderstands.
He claims on Twitter that he does all his own research (not sure if that includes TV, but probably does) and I believe him because he is well read.
The key to him being so good is that he listens to answers and is then capable of taking the conversation where they lead, being well read allows him to do that.
I’ve lost count of the times I’ve heard a journalist ask a question, wait for the answer then move on to the next scripted question, eventually asking a question that was covered in a previous answer. Sometimes its even the next question. I’m surprised no interviewee ever points this out, or maybe they do but by that time I’ve usually wandered off either physically or mentally and stopped listening.
Sadly that can’t happen. You have to be in a multi-national grouping to even qualify for staffing costs
Staffers who were working for Nigel Farage’s transnational EFDD European Parliamentary group are now on redundancy pay until November 2nd after the Brexit Party leader failed to form a new group with his old partners in the Italian Five Star Movement. Having no group means Farage loses money and even more crucially speaking time, and his front row seat, meaning we won’t be seeing a typical barnstorming EU election victory speech any time soon. It will also leave the new set of Brexit MEP’s with no support, guidance or clue as to the workings of the Parliament…
I’m not a big fan of Nige as a personality but I accept he is principled and definitely not some right wing fascist as the left and #FBPEers, to the extent they aren’t the same, like to paint him:
The Brexit Party has struggled to find allies in the new parliament after the centre-right collapsed in favour of Le Pen-aligned parties that Farage refuses to work with.
I don’t know how they’ll spin that but I’m sure they’ll find the mental contortions easy and not suffer any dissonance.
Yup, basically.
This whole cohort of UK MEPS was never supposed to happen anyway, so you can well understand it being treated as little more than a European Parliamentary version of “Panto Season”.
I’ll be glad when it’s done and we can finally leave though. I’m sure Nige will as well, even if he misses the EU salary and expenses.
(The internet really, REALLY needs a sarcasm font).
Isn’t that what Comic Sans is for?
Comic Sans is far too cuddly for that. It seems to press the buttons for lots of people. My wife continued to use it even when I pointed out what an Internet joke it had become. One of the impenetrable Gothic fonts might be better.
Worth watching entire ~20m segment to fully see how deluded Bénédicte Paviot, Lib Dems & Europhiles are – gist is everything EU does is good, democracy irrelevant
BBC This Week 04 July 2019
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Afs4PnM6zg – from ~7m
How many chins can you count? Ear looks weird too.
Another entitled rich Fatty telling us how to live – Lady Nugee’s sister?
Well done Flint, Neil and Portillo for attacking & shredding her blinkered EU worship – sadly it had no effect on her EU worship
Like Corbyn socialists she is wealthy and knows the EU socialist, green agenda will not affect her – but forgets “until they come for me”
Comment on arrse QT thread:
Portillo omitted: Britain is not party to Article 52 of the Lisbon Treaty in which the flag and anthem were established, but in 2020 we are.
“Not all Germans…”
Her mother still thinks she’s great!