Having raised the question of whether BBC's Question Time has lost its way through its selection of post-Robin Day chairmen and addition of a fifth guest (previous post) should enjoy this version from the Not the Nine O'clock News team.
If you can't imagine a comedian pulling off anything as effective as this by impersonating Peter Sissons or David Dimbleby in the chair, it arguably supports the point I was making in the previous post.
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Joe Haines's modest alliteration, the late William Safire and other Republican wordsmiths following the firm footprints of a Fifties' governor of Maryland
While crafting Anne Brennan's conference speech, Joe Haines speaks of his preference for "modest alliteration". A letter in The Economist of 15 October illustrates vividly what happens when immodesty strikes.
A splendid splenetic speech
SIR – Your obituary of William Safire (October 3rd) mentioned his fondness for alliteration, such as “nattering nabobs of negativism”, which he wrote for Spiro Agnew. The alliterative style is favoured by Republican wordsmiths, such as Safire but also Pat Buchanan and Victor Gold. All those men were disciples of Theodore Roosevelt McKeldin, a governor of Maryland who gave the nominating speech for Dwight Eisenhower at the 1952 Republican convention.
He rose to that occasion, and then later, on the campaign trail, reached even greater oratorical heights with the statement, “the plundering potentates of the Potomac and the pusillanimous parasites of the palace guard are having their last ride on the merry-go-round of privilege and pelf.”
William Burke
San Francisco
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