Hugs And Shakes Before Nick Griffin’s Question Time Wobble

BRITISH politics is in such a dire state that even our Great British leader of our Great British far-right extremists is twitchy, nervy and about as skilful an orator as Worzel Gummidge, a Great British scarecrow in a Great British field, in a Great British tizz.

The media, however, has not said enough about Nick Griffin, and we continue our round up of all the views and news on the BBC telly Question Time show with this delightful insight from black female culture vulture Bonnie Greer, she of the BBC’s speed dial nodding head service.

In “When Bonnie Greer met Nick Griffin”, the London Evening Standard’s David Cohen pits Greer and Griffin head to head.

Griffin looks not enough unlike the monster from The Goonies, while Greer looks on him as if eyeing a interestingly shaped turd.

Greer takes us inside the locker room:

“It was the strangest thing because as I came out of my dressing room prepared for combat, it was as if he’d been waiting for me in the corridor.

“I was the last to emerge and when he saw me, he turned and smiled his greasy smile and clumsily half extended a hand. I ignored it and thought to myself: what are you about? Are you forgetting I’m black? Are you forgetting you called me a black history fabricator? Are you trying to show me you aren’t racist?”

All good stuff, and much better than what we saw on camera. But the best is yet to come, and it may well be the most gut-wrenching thing you read about Griffin’s outing ever:

There was a touching moment, she says, just before they started recording when Sayeda Warsi ran over to her and said: “Are you okay sitting next to Griffin?” “I said: ‘I’m from Chicago, I’m not scared of this guy!’ And we just hugged spontaneously. We were like two prize-fighters going into the ring to do battle.”

Or you were like a couple of jobbing opinion formers and opinion supporters jumping into a televised debate with a sub-standard man with deep issues who could not even remember his lines.

And this is not all. On the matter of sympathy for the Griffin, the Evening Standard’s David Sexton opines:

Nick Griffin is not a sympathetic man. He completely lacks charisma and he doesn’t speak persuasively.

His manner is freakish. He can’t stop himself from grinning and giggling inappropriately. He’s quite shaky and he licks his lips nervously…

Yet it was impossible to watch this grotesque edition of Question Time and not feel some little tinge of sympathy for him, nonetheless.

Why’s that then?

For this was not a political discussion programme but a show trial from start to finish.

So it wasn’t a fight, then…

Anorak

Posted: 23rd, October 2009 | In: Politicians Comments (6) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink