No Author Without Smoke

'Smoking Martyr' Lynn Barber pulls out of festival | Books | guardian.co.uk

Author and journalist Lynn Barber has withdrawn from a literary festival after the local council refused to include a photograph of her smoking in its brochure for the event. Her ferocious interview technique earned her the soubriquet Demon Barber, but this is the first time she has been branded a potentially corrupting influence.

Jesus.

I'm Boozing For Britain!

Much merriment in the press about Liam Byrne's Demos pamphlet, A More United Kingdom, produced at the behest of Gordon Brown to come up with jolly wheezes to make us proud to be British.

What's causing the merriment is no 13 of the 'Twenty-seven ways to celebrate a national day': namely, 'through drinking'.

Presumably not through binge drinking, or underage drinking.

A lot of suggestions centre around organising public events and festivities (street parties, carnivals, etc) without taking into account the nightmare of regulation confronting anyone wanting to do anything in public these days - (health and safety, banning terrorists, paedophiles, people wanting to take photos, etc, etc).

I had to dig around on the internet to find the original text of the pamphlet, since our wonderful professional journalists rarely provide details of their sources. You can read it as a free pdf here (I certainly wouldn't waste £10 for a hard copy).

It's a patronising load of guff, as you'd expect.

Give me the booze, Liam, and fuck off.