Sunday, 7 April 2019

Extraordinary, yeah, yeah


For the many not the Afua


Referring all honourable ladies and gentleman to a piece I posted a few hours ago, where I noted that: 
Leading into his paper review this morning Andrew Marr talked of "a growing fear in Fleet Street that we are on the edge of a Corbyn-led labour government" and described the The Sunday Times as "going flat out for Corbyn" with its antisemitism story, and then, turning to the Mail on Sunday, said, "And look at this...an eight-page pullout, 'How to protect your cash from Corbyn'. 
What I didn't note there was the tone of voice Andrew Marr used when reading out the MoS's headline. It was delivered in an OTT style, and clearly meant mockingly. 

As you can see, Andrew was (thrice) signalling here that he didn't think much of these stories. He linked them to Fleet Street's "growing fear" of a Corbyn-led Labour government rather than taking them on their own terms, used language such as "going flat out" to describe The Sunday Times's extraordinary reporting of Labour antisemitism, and then sneered at the Mail on Sunday.

And paper reviewer Afua Hirsch pretty much echoed his point-of-view later, with Andrew adding a supportive 'Extraordinary, yeah, yeah' in the middle of her highly questionable comments.

Here's a transcript:
AFUA HIRSCH: The other half's clearly panicking about the likelihood of Corbyn getting more legitimacy. You've got these stories about him being a Marxist, about him being an anti-Semite, or presiding over an anti-Semitic party, how to protect your assets from Corbyn. 
ANDREW MARR: Extraordinary, yeah, yeah.  
AFUA HIRSCH: There is clearly a rising sense he needs to be taken seriously as someone who could be gaining ground out of this process.
Acceptable behaviour from Andrew Marr, do you think?

(If he's hoping this kind of thing will spare him the ire of the Corbynistas he's surely whistling in the wind).