Littlejohn shits on Diana's Parade! Red Ken and more!

[Lennon Saviour of E]

Another Diana memorial? Get me out of here!

My invitation to the Lady Di memorial service seems to have got lost in the post. Probably just as well, since I would have been forced to make my excuses. What I don't understand is why we're having another service. I can't recall there being anything similar in honour of Sir Winston Churchill ten years after his death. Or anyone else, for that matter.

Surely the form is: you get the funeral out of the way, hold a memorial service within a few months and life goes on. What's this one about? We've already had a pop concert for Diana this summer.

There was a candlelit vigil at Gracelands recently, on the 30th anniversary of Elvis Presley's departure from this mortal coil. But at least he made a few decent records. When an RCA company executive was told that Elvis had died, he is reported to have said: "Great career move." I've always felt the same about the death of Diana. She was already hurtling towards her Norma Desmond years when she met her end in the Alma tunnel. Had she lived, she would probably have ended up rattling around some drafty chateau, surrounded by autographed photos of Duran Duran, bemoaning to her faithful retainer Burrell that she was still big, it was the world which got small.

I'm ready for my profile now. The only paparazzi pictures still to get published would be those bitching about her cellulite as she was lowered into the Med from the yacht of some ageing Eurotrash playboy. In an attempt to salvage what was left of her reputation, after a decade of gallivanting round the world with a succession of unsuitable suitors, she would have latched on to "global warming" as enthusiastically as she once embraced AIDS victims.

You can just see her paying a visit to the climate change camp at Heathrow in the early hours of the morning, weeping crocodile tears over the fate of eskimos allegedly threatened by putting on a few extra flights at Stansted. Either that, or she'd have turned up in the jungle on a special royal version of I'm a Princess, Get Me Out of Here! with Fergie and that ghastly Kent woman.

By now, you'll have gathered that I wasn't a fan. Not that I wished her ill, I just couldn't understand the obsession with her. Her celebrity was founded entirely upon her marriage. Without that, she'd have been just another dopey Sloane Ranger. Yet when she divorced Charles she carried on as if nothing had changed, saying she intended to continue as an "independent" member of the Royal Family.

I can remember remarking at the time that was a bit like Bianca Jagger announcing that she was remaining an independent member of the Rolling Stones. Though Lady Di didn't invent the cult of celebrity she certainly defined it. I'm baffled by the way adults invest so much in people they don't know.

To be in London in the days after her death was to be transported into a parallel universe of vicarious grief, emotional incontinence and dangerous madness. Who were all these deranged mourners and where did they come from?

I managed to book a last-minute mercy flight to Majorca to escape the funeral. It was like the last plane out of Saigon.
There's nothing worse than the sentimentality of the mob. One man was beaten up for washing his car on the morning of the funeral. Not showing enough "respect", you see. And then, it just passed. The following year, they organised a memorial walk in Hyde Park to mark the first anniversary of her death. Three madwomen and a dog turned up and it was called off.

So here we are ten years on and it's time for yet another memorial service, an opportunity to release a special collectors' edition DVD and knock out all those unsold teatowels, mugs and Lady Di dolls which have been gathering dust in lockups all over London the past few years. Last time the row was over the Queen and the rest of the family staying up at Balmoral. I can't say I blamed them, given the lachrymose lunacy on the streets of our capital city. Now all the fuss is over Camilla's on-off appearance at the service. Frankly, who cares?

I couldn't help wondering who would be there if it was Diana's funeral on Friday, not her memorial service. Sir Elton of John would be reprising Candle In The Wind, naturally. Only this time he'd be joined by Pete Doherty, completely off his face after celebrating yet another walk on a drugs charge.

The Queen would be played by Helen Mirren. Guests would include Jade Goody, Shilpa Shetty, Waynetta Rooney; a smattering of celebrity chefs, gardeners and makeover artistes; Spangles Kaplinsky, Sharon Osbourne and Dannii Minogue; Ant and Dec; and the Beckhams. The service would be conducted by Graham Norton and the Vicar of Dibley. Commentary not by a Dimbleby, but shared between Jonathan Ross and Davina McCall. Major James Hewitt would read from the Book of Morton. There would be a march past by the Queen's Own Hoodies and a 21-handgun salute, courtesy of Brixton's Crayzee Eyes Killas Crew.

It's what she would have wanted.

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About time...signs of climate change at the Beeb

Three cheers for Newsnight's editor, Peter Barron, who says it is not the BBC's job to save the planet. Speaking in Edinburgh, he criticised the corporation's plans to screen a special day of programmes, under the working title of Planet Earth to raise awareness of climate change. Raise awareness? Is there anyone, anywhere in Britain, unaware of so-called global warming? We're drip fed a constant diet of alarmist propaganda every hour, on the hour, day in, day out. We don't need Ricky Gervais in a green nose ramming it down our throats. The existence of global warming is an article of faith at the Beeb.

Anyone who questions it is treated like a heretic. Recently the BBC spent a small fortune covering the fatuous Live Earth concert. The audience averaged a paltry 900,000. BBC spokesmen point out that when Madonna was on, the number of viewers rose to 4.5 million - which proves that people are concerned about "climate change". No it doesn't. It proves they like Madonna. They'd have tuned in if she'd been performing at a Bring Back Hanging rally. We've now reached a stage where even respected BBC insiders are warning about the political bias and lack of objectivity. It may not be too late to save the planet, but it might be too late to save the BBC.

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They're coming to take him away, ha ha

Ken Livingstone appears to be suffering from a form of political Munchausen's, a psychiatric condition in which patients feign pain in order to attract sympathy to themselves. That can be the only explanation for him bursting into tears during an apology for the slave trade. It was a pitiful exhibition. London's mayor was sharing a platform with another celebrated shyster and shakedown artist, the Rev Jesse Jackson.

We don't need another apology for slavery. We all know it was an evil enterprise, but Britain was first to abolish slavery and our navy helped eradicate it on the high seas. I resent the continuing attempts by chancers like Livingstone to make us all feel guilty. We weren't there and we can't apologise for something we didn't do.

We all know what's in it for Jackson. He wants "reparations" from modern business which were associated with slavery hundreds of years ago. But if Livingstone isn't in the grip of mental illness, what's in it for him?

My guess is that he's rattled by the challenge of Boris Johnson, whom the Livingstone camp is desperately trying to smear as a "racist". Bawling his eyes out over the suffering of Kunta Kinte is a way of demonstrating his own "anti-racist" credentials - though that doesn't prevent him making offensive remarks to Jews. Funny, I don't remember him crying for the victims of the Harrods bombing when he was inviting the IRA to tea at County Hall in the 1980s.

At this rate, Boris might not have to defeat Livingstone at the polls. The men in white coats might beat him to it.

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So which is it? Is Learco Chindamo, killer of headmaster Philip Lawrence, still a clear and present danger to the public?

Or will he be at such risk himself on his early release that he and his family will have to be given new identities, at a cost of £1million?

Why take a chance either way? Just keep him locked up and say it's for his own safety.

[westboy]

Yes, Diana made sure the cameras were there every time she did something good, but that's why the people loved her and when something as tragic (whether you liked her or not/thought it was a conspiracy or not it was tragic) as what happened that night in Paris happened of course there's going to be an emotional outpour. It's partly because of the light she was portrayed in by the media but also the attitude in this country especially of 'Anyone who dies was a wonderful person...'.

As for the beeb, well what can you say. I don't have a problem with their service, I think the website portal is excellent and there are some good TV programs (as well as some bad, inevitably) but I heard there coverage from Live Aid (I didn't watch it) was completely biased, there was no criticism of this magical way of saving the planet (having a huge concert) and the whole thing was completely unbalanced.

I wouldn't have a problem paying the license fee because it's good value imo, HOWEVER thats my opinion, people shouldn't be forced to pay for something they don't necessarily use.

[kiko]

It was nice that Diana was put on the back burner for a bit while the Maddy story was going on in the Express. The things been running it for 10 years.

[Lennon Saviour of E]

Yes, Diana made sure the cameras were there every time she did something good, but that's why the people loved her and when something as tragic (whether you liked her or not/thought it was a conspiracy or not it was tragic) as what happened that night in Paris happened of course there's going to be an emotional outpour.

Not to that scary extent. Some of the main channels were effectively shut down for days, football matches cancelled for some bizarre reason.

It was no more to me than some soap bird popping her clogs. Or say Liz Hurley.

[superally]

In regards to the reaction to Diana's death, Lennon's hero is correct on this one.

I have to agree!

[FATPIPE]

hmm i tend to agree

[Caesarius]

I never understood the thing with celebrating deaths. I can understand celebrating their birth perhaps when their dead (even that seems weird to me) but this is something that they should do privately if they wish amongst themselves.

[westboy]

Would William and Harry have done all this if there wasn't the public "interest" in Diana though? I think they're doing it because of the interest rather than the other way round.

[kiko]

It's there mother ffs. They're not doing a commemoration for shits and giggles.