Damon Albarn, Banksy, Jo Brand, Bill Bailey, Billy Bragg, Tim Campbell (Apprentice winner), Anthony Gormley, Phill Jupitus, Peter Kennard, Alistair McGowan, Jonthan Porritt, Vince Power, Tony Robinson, Prunella Scales, Arthur Smith, Ralph Steadman, Emma Thompson, Vivienne Westwood, Richard Wilson and Robert Wyatt.I can't think the release of this list will attract a single vote to Livingstone. It's like a memorial service for Red Wedge. Not exactly 'cool Britannia'. I've never even heard of three of them. Livingstone may well come to regret publishing this list. I'm sure I remember hearing Emma Thompson say recently that she endorsed some of his policies "but not the man".
Monday, April 14, 2008
Ken's 'Celebrity' Conundrum
A few weeks ago Ken Livingstone said the London Mayoral Race was not "Celebrity Big Brother" and that it should be about policy, not personality. However, it seems he has changed his mind. Today, he's released a list of 20 Celebrity backers, full of usual suspects of lefty 'hangers on'.
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58 comments:
How on earth can he vouch for Banksy's voting intentions?
I presume this is the same Billy Bragg who loves London so much he lives in Dorset?
If anything this list of tired old left wing media whores will put people off. Billy Bragg's supporting Ken you say? Remind me where the hypocrite lives? Tony Robinson? God help us. I notice Stephen Fry is not on the list. Has he had the good sense to stay in Norfolk until the whole sordid business is over?
You've made this us, right? Not even Ken would be so stupid as to publish this. Or is it another clever trick from Boris like that letter to the Guardian a couple of weeks ago by the so-called 'progrssives'?
Well Banksy and Tony Robinson are both bristolians so don't have to put up with ken on a daily basis.
The other thing about banksy is he is very much uncontactable for a quick confirmation; though having just emailed a bristol client who does know (the real)him - and has for a very long time - the response was along the lines its not very likely..or "fucking bollocks" to quote directly.
Ah yes William Bragg a long term favourite of mine :He is a professional Londoner (from Barking actually and not that badly off) and professionally working class( Never had a proper job in his life ).
His earliest crime was Red Wedge ,launched on November 21, 1985, at a reception at the Palace of Westminster hosted by Labour MP Robin Cook. It took its name from a 1919 poster by Russian constructivist artist El Lissitzky, Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge. Typically Bragg presents as rebellion what was actually invertebrate fawning before the arts and Liberal establishment An additional theme to note is the extreme pretension of the stupid name .
When it comes to stupid names the mother of them all must surely be Charter88. It was the British pressure group that advocated constitutional and electoral reform.It took its name from Charter 77 - the Czech dissident movement co-founded by Václav Havel and included Salman Rushdie and Pinter and various arts luvvies like Bragg who use to have a good old whine about their grants in Pubs around Islington Green .
The real thing ( 77) was just a teeny bit more serious being an artist revolt against a brutal Communist regime. Several means of retaliation were used against the Czech signers, including dismissal from work, denial of educational opportunities for their children, suspension of drivers' licenses.
Now he wants to lend his support to Ken Livingstones Multicultural London well...GUESS WHERE HE LIVES.- IN A BLOODY BIG HOUSE IN THE MIDDLE OF DORSET. 'ALLWHITE 'as he might put it in his stagey Mockney
Dorset has a population of 407,217, plus 165,370 in Bournemouth and 137,562 in Poole (total 710,149 — mid-year estimates for 2006.91.3% of Dorset's population were born in England and 95.2% were born within the United Kingdom. 98.8% are indigenous, ..an extreme example of the disproportionately small ethnic minority population in rural areas.78% of the population are Christian
What a James Blunt !
Charlie Brooker got it dead right today:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/14/charliebrooker.boris
I suspect that many on Ken's list and millions more will agree n100% with Charlie...
After 8 years in the top job, is that all the support he can muster? Superannuated luvvies (they need Tony Robinson and hisTime Team in there just to carbon date some of them); musicians who haven't done anything since the advent of the CD; and a "graffiti artist" (who may be iconic of our times, but still - he has only made his name inflicting criminal damage on the capital).
Marquee Mark
I see there are a lot of comedians in that list. Makes sense really, Ken's campaign has been one big joke from the beginning...
Wouldn't it be tragic if this lot were in the wrong place at the right time, as one of Ken's Bendy Buses mounted the pavement they were standing on?
An orgasm of BBC luvvies!!
I support *some* of Livingstone's policies but "so what?" - it doesn't mean I want him to be Mayor after 1st May.
"Paddy Briggs" once again proves that there is no limit to the delusion that Trots suffer from.
Charlie Brooker's article was complete crap, much like everything else he writes.
Pretty sure Vivienne Westwood said last year that she might be voting Conservative at the next general election.
Is that Brooker article the most intelligent attack on Boris that the Left can muster?
"LOL OMFG!"@Mr Brooker
Joe Brand lives in Cornwall I think ( and by the way is nearly 60 and not her public age) Where pie-faced creep Konnie Huq , what about GMTV Kate and Baroness Fiona .
This confuses me as well
'The high priestess of punk, Dame Vivienne Westwood, who has vowed to vote Conservative at the next election, could not resist a political statement at her first catwalk show in London for 10 years.'
Is she a little confused ? Should she stick to her knitting mayhap ?
(Sounds like another cunning plan from teeny but popular children`s clown Tony Robinson...he is a giggle isn't he ,the way he falls over and gets punched and stuff )
Nothos said "I see there are a lot of comedians on that list."
ReallY? I didn't see any.
Ken will do anything to stay in power. He knows he won't get another chance, so he has absolutely nothing to lose by trying every trick in the book and everything to gain.
I take it that as Brown is going to the Temple with Ken today, there may be a Labour constituency penciled in for him if he loses.
But maybe it has worked - Boris' lead in the polls has halved according to the Evening Standard today (hardly a bastion for Ken).
If Mr. Bragg wants to bugger off back to London, I can assure him that the residents of Dorset will be only too pleased.
The end of another hectoring, smart-arse, trendy lefty/liberal incomer.
Just to be clear, congestion charge, Olympics and even Ken / Boris - we don't give a toss about your dirty, smelly, over populated dive, so just leave us alone.
The most alarming thing about most of those leftie throwbacks on the list is that they were Labour supporters before it became "Nu Labour."
Which means that they first took up the cudgels on behalf of that idiot Neil Kinnock, whose family have gone on to make a fortune out of his failure as a UK politician.
More who?, than Who's who...
On ancient puppets I wonder who Pinky and Perky or Muffin the Mule support .(Of course for Iain Muffin the Mule is an adult game.)
How many of these do live in London then? As has previously been mentioned, Tony Robinson and Banksy are both from Bristol. Billy Bragg lives in Dorset. I got the impression that quite a few others don't live in the capital either. Wouldn't it be embarrassing for Ken if it turned out that a majority of his 'celebs' weren't going to vote for him
None of those people would ever have been heard from again in Broadcasting House if they had come out for Boris.
The general approach on the left is to state that Boris couldn't run a piss up in a brewery.
Leave aside the fact that intellectually Boris is premier league to Ken's Sunday league, what is so special about what Ken has done?????
Unless trebling the cost of his precious position counts as a success.
These are impressive celebrities.
My faves are
Billy Bragg;
Phill Jupitus;
Tony Robinson;
Richard Wilson:
Surely there is someone for everyone onm this list.
Great entertainers.
Charlie Brooker's article was complete crap, much like everything else he writes
Can't agree there. I despise Livingstone and really hope Johnson takes it, but no-one who actually likes and apprciates comedy can claim that TV Go Home or Nathan Barley were 'crap'.
Well the good news is that after the next election all these Ken fans will have to be put out to grass. Not even the BBC could be so out of touch as to give more wall to wall employment to a load of Labour luvvies after the Tories have won by a landslide.
Mr. Anonymous, Nathan Barley was not funny in the slightest. Where were the jokes? I'm not a joyless cynic (not all of the time), but Nathan Barley was truly awful. The Nathan Barley character had so much potential...
Anyway, striding back to the point, I'm surprised Boris hasn't exploited Banksy's support for Ken (and yes, Banksy really is a fan of Mr. Livingstone, he's donated money made off one of his many auctions to Ken's campaign). How Ken can claim to be tough on criminal damage yet welcome endorsement from someone who has damaged trains, walls and other assorted street and railway furniture for the past 8 years beggars belief.
Shouldn't Jonthan Porritt be backing the Greenie candidate?
Newmania said...
"He is a professional Londoner (from Barking actually ...)"
He is from Dagenham not Barking.
Jo Brand, Bill Bailey, Phil Jupitus, Vivienne Westwood?!! It seems Ken's cornering the 'Fatty Vote' shame on the gluttonous lot of them for contributing to the increase in World food prices.
Charlie Brooker ? I think he inadvertently published an email to a fellow member of the "I`m a tedious tit " club, today in the Guardian.
Hope it does not effect his career as a...what is he ? How embarrassing
These "celebs" will have a vote in London because they live in Dorset, etc. but HAVE SECOND HOMES! True socialists!
Newmania said...
"Joe Brand lives in Cornwall I think ( and by the way is nearly 60 and not her public age)"
She had a place in Shropshire but now lives in East Dulwich.
Her youngest daughter is now 5 so by your reckoning Brand must have given birth at age nearly 55.
A high status piece of samian ware, so we can assume a fat Tory bastard lived here, Phil ?
Ooooh aaaah, Tony.
I find it laughable that Billy 'right on' Bragg supports Ken.
Billy Bragg loves to bang-on about how nasty the average Brit is, how instinctively racist we all are, and how the class war still needs fighting! It is as if he is still manning the barricades in northern terraced streets, defending worlking class honour against the capitalistas!
However, all his rantings eminate from his 6 bed detatched beachfront villa in Burton Bradstock (Dorset's most exclusive address where modest two bed bungalows go for at least £750,000)!
My cousin (a bit of an old lefty herself) is one of Billy's neighbours (three villas away), and even she admits he sounds like a twat when he bangs on about his pet subjects from the exclusion zone of reality which is rural Dorset.
In other words (her words actually) "Billy Bragg is full of sh*te because he doesn't have to live with the consequences of his own policies"!
Unless of course he is visiting his crash-pad (er....sorry, huge mansion) in London!
As she reminded me recently, there has not been a non-white seen in Burton Bradstock since.....well, ever apparantly! As I said, she is a lefty, and even she thinks Bragg is a tosser!
I suspect that all those who supported Ken are in a similar position - ivory tower policies from ivory tower people!
Maybe we should go an picket his house at Burton Bradstock and let him know where he can stick his support for Ken, and make his exclusive rural idyl the hell that it is for those who have to live under Ken's tyrany!
We could start by charging him a tenner to drive his own car up his own drive!
Stephen William Bragg)
singer, songwriter
Born: 12/20/1957
Birthplace: Barking, Essex, England
Also known as the “Bard of Barking,”
Back of the net smart arse
Joe Brand - had a 50th last year which was believed by no--one as her school contemporaries had blown the whistle in her on numerous occassions. That was in Cornwall.
Her daughters were born in 96 so you are worng there .I`d say she is 55 at least.
I thought Vivienne Westwood was a 'new Tory'?
Anthony Gormley has a proposal in to turn Trafalgar Square's vacant fourth plinth into a public soap box for more than 8,000 people.
"The winner will be chosen by a committee to be approved by Ken Livingstone, the Mayor of London."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/01/09/nplinth109.xml
Westwood unveils new threads at London Fashion Week:....
The British Fashion Council, which accommodated Ms Westwood's latest range, received a cash boost of £4.2 million from mayor Ken Livingstone last year, aimed at raising the organisation's international profile.
http://www.lookfantastic.com/home/Lookfantastic_Celebrity_News_Archive.html?ArticleID=18471333
Re Jo Brand, it's so hard to tell with fat people. The one judgement one can make with any certainty about fat people is, they eat too much.
Newmania said...
Joe Brand - her school contemporaries had blown the whistle in her on numerous occassions. That was in Cornwall.
Her daughters were born in 96 so you are worng there .I`d say she is 55 at least.
Wrong all round.
Newmania - Jo Brand's younger daughter was born in 2003.
Then she must have been grown by aliens in a vat for implanation Not so unusual for plutocrat celebs.. No way is she only 51 now. 55...at least.
I quite like her actually ..well I did , but she has definitely lied about her age.
You can see why ,40 something and you can do tampon gags , 50 something ,..
... well thats just disgusting.
Newmania said...
"Joe Brand - her school contemporaries had blown the whistle in her on numerous occassions. That was in Cornwall."
Cornwall? Oh, I see you are talking are talking about Joe Brown. Iain is referring to the comedienne Jo Brown who went to school in Kent.
"I've never even heard of three of them."
I've never heard of eight of them. Wish I'd never heard of most of the others especially Jo not-really-funny-but-talks-about-dicks-a-lot Brand.
Who are Peter Kennard, Vince Power and Robert Wyatt?
Bill Bailey lives in Hammersmith Grove. If he was true to his socialist principles he'd shop in the monocultural Muslim enclave of Shepherds Bush Market but he prefers to shop, with a sour ill-tempered face, in Marks and Spencer.
Only seem to be one or two Red Wedgers in the list Iain. Let's see Boris' list of bloated plutocrats.
Is it true that Darius Guppy is to be rehabilitated as Crime Czar? Should the buffoon Johnson actually win.
He's not fit to run a clown show.
"Also known as the “Bard of Barking"
I know ppl who still live in Barking, and I can assure you that is NOT what they call him, though it is somewhat close...
PS Paddy is right about Charlie. Genius.
Chris Paul, I don't see the connection. Has Darius Guppy been given lifelong employment by the BBC with instructions to make what passes for jokes about the opposition?
"Has Darius Guppy been given lifelong employment by the BBC ...?"
He is now out of prison but does not live in the UK.
Speaking of 'celebrity', I hope you all enjoy this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssyuM8A6zF4#
The job is a joke, a sideshow for people who could not otherwise be considered serious politicians, including in London. What does the Mayor actually do, anyway?
And as for having a national impact, what national impact has Ken Livingstone had? Nor would figures like Boris Johnson spring up all over the place if he won.
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