News Diary

THE most powerful woman in publishing (The Times) has spoken. Amanda Ross of Cactus TV is the brains behind Richard & Judy, beloved by saddoes across the land, in which capacity she has chosen eight books which comprise the shortlist for R & J's Book Club. So influential is this Oprah clone that 21 of last year's 100 top paperback bestsellers were recommended by the doyens of daytime viewing. Quoth Ms Judy, the Queenie Leavis de nos jour: "Book Club demystifies books by stripping them down to what they are: stories."

According to the ever unreliable Times, R & J's imprimatur is a better guarantee of sales than the Booker. "Life of Pi, by Yann Martel, broke through the magic million mark, but sales for his next Booker-nominated novel, When We Were Orphans, rose only slightly ... in the month after being nominated." I, surely, do not need to tell you that When We Were Orphans was not written by Mr Martel but by Kazuo Ishiguro. Ach weel.

One's personal nausea at the thought of R & J is tempered by the news that among the anointed titles is The Testament Of Gideon Mack by my dear friend, James Robertson. One looks forward to seeing him some teatime soon swapping bon mots in Lallans with the planet's most discerning critics.

Independence day looms for Cammie

CAMERON is coming! And - some might say - not before time. David Cameron, leader of the Dodos, has ordered his shadow cabinet to "fan out" like grouse beaters across Scotland to flush out potential voters.

One admires his chutzpah but fears it is much too little, much too late. Coinciding with this exciting development came the revelation that Archie Stirling, whose greatest claim to fame is that he was once married to Diana Rigg (Tracy Di Vicenzo in On Her Majesty's Secret Service), has invented a new political party which some reports say will be called Scottish Voice and others insist will be Scottish Democrats. Such indecision does not augur well but will, nevertheless, cause some angst to Cammie who must wonder why, if a toff has money to burn, he is not chucking it into the Dodos' bonfire.

The reason, I fear, may be my dear friend Annabel "Head Girl" Goldie who, since she succeeded Dafydd McLutchie-at-Straws, has done little to inspire the sixth-form common room. Indeed, there are those who predict that come May 3 the Dodos will have even fewer MSPs than the 17 they have now. Short of bringing back Mr McLutchie-at-Straws, who could at least count on the votes of the nation's cabbies, they are stuck with Ms Goldie - hence Mr Cammie's northward charge.

It will, I unhappily predict, end in ignominy and Cammie will return home to think again, pondering perhaps whether it's worth wasting energy trying to woo the Scots to his brand of touchy-feely conservatism. He may yet, like others in his ranks, come to the conclusion that if the Dodos are ever again to wrestle power from Noo Labour then they would have a better chance without the numerous unreconstructed socialist Jimmys who are routinely re-elected to Westminster despite their obvious mental deficiencies.

In short, he, like other former ardent unionists, will undergo a Damascene conversion and begin to see the sense in independence. You read it here first.

A deadline to be missed TARRY ye not! Today is your last chance to avail yourselves of the sort of offer only a tumshie would turn down. I refer, of course, to Mayday! Mayday! (aka SoS) which has been auctioning off its staff at unbeatable discounts, all - so they say! - in aid of charity.

You could, for example, if you were a few prawns short of a cocktail, "sit in on editorial conferences and watch as pages are designed, pictures are chosen and stories are written". Alternatively, you could opt for a full-frontal lobotomy.

Other delights include a day at the races with my old chum, Martin "Champion Hurdler" Hannan, have one of your rooms made over ("must be within Edinburgh and the Lothians") or visit Holyrood and tell the numpties "what you think they should be debating by handing in your own petition". Verily, my mouth's watering at the prospect.

Nothing, though, compares with "Lot: 5", the promise of attending "a top literary launch party" with Mayday! Mayday's pulchritudinous literary editor, Stuart Kelly, "where you get to mix with authors".

Eager to avail myself of this once-in-a lifetime opportunity, I logged on to the appropriate website and prepared to make a bid - only to discover that Mr Kelly appears to have had a life changing op, he becoming a she, and very fetching s/he looks too. Hurry while stocks last!

When a tyrant's no longer useful RELUCTANTLY, I return to the subject of the execution of Saddam Shame, the Quality Street-loving dictator. No doubt it will cheer George Dubya, the famous mountain-biker, to learn that Mr Shame's demise has the support of the independent-thinking Brian Monteith MSP, whose inglorious days at Holyrood are numbered. In his wisdom, Mr Monteith believes that Mr Shame got off lightly, hanging being too good for him. "Not even George Galloway," he burbles, "would claim Saddam Hussein was innocent of executing thousands of people or gassing the Kurds or killing the Marsh Arabs."

I dare say he is right, but, as ever, he is also way off beam. No one is suggesting that Mr Shame did not murder many people. What some of us are saying, though, is that executing human beings is barbaric and unlikely to result in a more civilised world. Did tying a noose around the necks of Herr Adolf's henchmen solve anything? Moreover - apropos the gassing of the Kurds - why did the West (ie us and the Yanks) stand by and let it happen? Throughout the 1980s, UN weapons inspectors accused the Iraqis of using chemical weapons yet the Western powers turned a blind eye. Why? Because Mr Shame was useful to them, in particular vis-a-vis Iran.

When he was no longer useful, after, for example, he took it upon himself to invade Kuwait, thus jeopardising oil revenues, his number was up.

By the way, how prescient was Bob Dylan? "They're selling postcards of the hanging ..."