Daily catch-up: episode seven, smoking the Kippers and Scottish news
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Your support makes all the difference.1. Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens. The film will not be released for another 12 months, but the official trailer had already been watched 33 million times by this morning.
2. Cameron smokes the Kippers. I wrote about the Prime Minister’s speech about immigration and free movement of EU workers in The Independent on Sunday. My view is that, far from appeasing UKIP, David Cameron is trying to keep Britain in the EU by doing what he can to meet the concerns of the centre ground of public opinion, which wants less immigration, realises how hard this is while we are in the EU but is still reluctant to leave.
As for how deliverable Cameron’s plan is, a lot depends on what requires treaty changes. Steve Peers says that a lot more of what Cameron wants needs treaty change than Open Europe claims.
The Who’d Ha’ Thought It: Also in The Independent on Sunday, I have the Top 10 Odd Pub Names. Listellany: A Miscellany of Very British Top 10s, from Politics to Pop (Elliott & Thompson, £9.99; e-book £4.99) is out now.
3. Jonathan Powell, Tony Blair’s former chief of staff, says it is always worth talking to “terrorists”, even Isis. He came to King’s College, London, my new academic home, last week to talk about his book.
4. Scottish news. “I look around me at what the Yes movement has become. And I think I want out.” An excellent post about nationalist fundamentalism.
“Gordon always says he never reads the newspapers and yet he can quote whole pages back to you.” Terrific independence referendum campaign diary by Alan Cochrane, the Daily Telegraph journalist who advised the Better Together campaign and who nearly went to work for David Cameron as a special adviser. The Prime Minister will not be pleased that Cochrane reports this:
“As we ate venison, DC moaned about the fact that he couldn’t go deer stalking any more. I suppose he doesn’t want to hark back to the grouse-moor-image days of Harold Macmillan, or to be seen out with a rifle. But apparently he’s a very good shot ...
“DC says that recently he fancied a bit of shooting, so took his 12-bore out into a wood near his home and bagged a couple of pigeons. It must have been quite a sight – the wood had to be surrounded by coppers with guns. Whether that was to protect the ramblers from the PM or the PM from the ramblers wasn’t clear. Anyway, he misses shooting/killing things.”
5. A pie chart, via Andrew Ducker.
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6. And finally, thanks to Darien Graham-Smith for this:
Q: How does Batman's mother call him in for dinner?
A: Batman’s mother is dead. Awkward.
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