John Prescott

Posted on 2004/08/16 22:15:39 (August 2004) by john.

Leave the poor bloke alone.

I was intrigued today by the story about John Prescott rescuing an endangered kayaker in North Wales (see here). I thought this was a really nice story about a politician doing something good for a change. Why they couldn't just leave it at that, I don't know.

Unfortunately, every report I saw about it on the TV felt it relevant to remind everyone about that egg throwing incident a couple of years back, where he ended up in a scuffle with a member of the public. I find myself really annoyed by this. Now I'm not trying to say John Prescott is my hero or anything, but at the same time, the guy has clearly done something good here, and the media can't help but try to drag the poor man down. It would be a bit like, every time Bob Geldoff saved a starving African, the news report also mentioning that he did once scawl some grafitti on a London Bus.

Do they have a personal vendetta against him or something? Is it because, gasp, he's a Labour cabinet Minister who actually has some socialist principles and a Northern accent? Or is it just that, as a society, we've become so cynical that we don't want to hear nice things about people in the public eye, we'd much rather see them dragged through the mud.

The news article mentioned that Mr Prescott actually went on two white water rafting trips today, so I'm sure somebody somewhere has hilariously started calling him "Two Rafts" Prescott, or something equally ingenious. Yea, well done.

Before we get all nice about Mr Prescott, how do you know that it wasn't the excess water displaced when he went rafting that caused the floods in Cornwall? He is a rather hefty chap after all.

Posted by Mike at 2004/08/17 09:32:15.

I agree John. I think it is a terrible pity that people can't just let sleeping dogs lie. People have good days and bad days, why can't they underdstand that. We have humans in government, after all.

I thought the kayaking story was great as it was clearly not a press set up and it showed a level of humanity and bravery where normally we see sleaze and lies. I'm beginning to think that politicians can't do anything right at all. Regardless what they do, the press is going to make a dog's dinner of it.

I'm exercising my right as an individual not to read papers anymore but get my weekly round-up from The Economist. From there, I don't hear about Big Bloody Brother, Mary who had 6 kids and then divorced her wealthy husband to live on the streets or soap star X who has cellulite. I hear about important things.

Posted by Rob Lang at 2004/08/17 10:10:39.

Rob, I don't like to hear about those sorts of things either. Luckily though, I seem quite able to avoid them all, without resorting to reading The Economist. But now I come to think about it, I do have a tendency to puchase New Scientist. Damn! Maybe we're in the same, sad boat!

Posted by Jimmy at 2004/08/17 18:07:55.

Jimmy can this comment really be from the same man who used to buy the Daily Mail in the morning, so he could get worked up right good and proper??

Posted by Mike at 2004/08/17 18:21:44.

Well, it kept me amused ...

Posted by Jimmy at 2004/08/18 08:47:49.

Jimmy, I like New Scientist too but when it comes to picking one of the shelf, The Economist pips it at the post.

I lost a little interest in New Scientist when Prof Warwick had some of his stuff in there unedited. I know it was unedited because I had read the proof Mark Gasson wrote for him!

Posted by Rob Lang at 2004/08/18 09:15:56.

Rob- how do you know prof Warwick? He was my prof when I was in the cybernetics dept. at Reading. Were you in cyb too? Also- I've never know The Economist to pip anything. Ever.

Posted by Jimmy at 2004/08/18 13:03:12.

I was in Cyb between 1995 and 2003 as MEng and Postie. Same year as John Whorekins but on the better side of the line.

Posted by Rob Lang at 2004/08/19 24:55:32.

Which line? If you mean the CompSci/Cyb line, then I'd agree that Cyb is the side of choice. If you mean the postie/indergrad line then certainly you'd want to be the postie. I remeber that when I was an undergrad, all the girlies seems to love the posties. The odd thing was, this seemed to be true irrespective of the incredible nerdiness of any given postie! Never did quite figure that one out...

Posted by Jimmy at 2004/08/20 09:02:39.

It's not related, but I found out the day before yesterday that the German word for subtitle is "Untertitel". It has been such a crap week at work, that this event really has constituted the highlight.

Posted by John at 2004/08/20 09:54:18.

"Is it because, gasp, he's a Labour cabinet Minister who actually has some socialist principles and a Northern accent?"

Basically, no and yes in that order.

The bloke’s an utter qunt and shouldn’t be in government. That’s probably the reason.

Posted by karl at 2004/08/23 23:15:17.

Compy Sci / Cyb line. I was in the same year as Johnboy but in Cybernetics. I did the four year so was one year behind in my PhD starting.

Posted by Rob Lang at 2004/08/24 10:29:44.

What has this got to do with John "Throw an egg, throw a punch" Prescott?

Posted by tom at 2004/08/24 11:25:59.

I think we've proven that any convo is more interesting than John Prescott.

Posted by Rob Lang at 2004/08/26 16:46:29.

True.

Posted by tom at 2004/08/31 19:14:07.

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