MURPHY’S LAW AS JIM LAYS IT DOWN ON BEHALF OF ‘JEWRY’?

Tom Harris and Jim Murphy, I wonder if, in some way, they could be related? Certainly both were Glasgow Labour MPs, Blairites on the right of the party, both lost their seats and both have lost their cool over Jeremy Corbyn and the alleged anti-Semitism in the party. Just days ago Harris tore up his party card saying Labour was “not the place for me anymore”, admitting that he hadn’t exactly been a shrinking violet over Corby criticism. Blow me, now Murphy has taken out a paid-for ad in the Glasgow edition of the Jewish Telegraph where, “in sorrow and anger” - heaps more of the latter than the former! - he apologises to “British Jewry” for the damage he claims Labour has done to relationships.

It’s not even a coded attack on Corbyn, it’s a full frontal assault. “British Labour’s top-team has shown itself to be intellectually arrogant, emotionally inept and politically maladroit” he splutters, and rather than stop digging a hole of its own making the “leadership has asked for a bigger shovel”.

In the 800 words Jimbo alleges that he’s no longer active in frontline politics and has no leadership role – that was lost over his mindboggling inept role in Scotland – but if this isn’t a mini-manifesto then what is it? Murphy is a highly-paid adviser in Blair’s Institute for Global Change (“nothing less than a million, thanks”). His boss has been linked to the formation of a new political party said to have raised £50 million and while Blair denies his institute was preparing the infrastructure for a new party, “it was putting together a policy platform”. Nick Clegg hasn’t denied he’d be interested, Vince Cable has refused to say if he missed a crucial Brexit vote because he was discussing the creation of a new pro-EU party and David Milliband, from across the pond, is also rumoured to fancy the idea. So far no one has linked Harris to it, but then he is one of the smaller fish. You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to fancy a bet on this.

The Herald:

TURN ON, TUNE IN AND DROP OUT

Twist your radio dial (or press the buttons on these new fangled ones) to Radio 4 at 3pm on Tuesday for the first in a six-part series called Tara and George, about the lives of two people living on the streets in London Spitalfields. It’s written and presented by my old chum and colleague Audrey Gillan and the original music is by Teenage Fanclub drummer Francis MacDonald. Audrey, who lives off Brick Lane, has been recording the couple, both in their late forties, over the last two years. I’m sure it’s going to be brilliant, provocative, with a few laughs and hummable tunes. Audrey’s from Glasgow and was Foreign Correspondent of the Year for reportage of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

But her account of interviewing Glasgow crime boss Tam McGraw, aka The Licensee, is one of the best pieces of writing in Scottish journalism. It begins when she meets the fearsome Mags, wife of Tam, at the well-protected family home. She, Mags that is, is dripping in gold jewellery, including a necklace which reads Zoltan who, it quickly emerges, is the family pet, a fearsome-looking, slavering mutt or indeterminate heritage but murderous intent.

Tam, among other killings ascribed to him, was that of the Doyle family, all six of whom perished in the Ice Cream Wars, which was a turf fight over the selling of drugs, rather than pokey hats, from vans. McGraw denies he’s the city’s godfather, saying, “Glasgow’s a town called malice. Everybody’s jealous of everyone else.” But before the question could be put about his involvement in the Doyle deaths the door bursts open and it’s Mags screaming “Something’s wrong with Zoltan!” The dog, dear reader, had dropped dead of a heart attack. It was a harbinger of what was to befall his master not long afterwards.

HERE’S ONE TO WOBBLE YOUR KNEES

Today marks the start of Elvis week, uh-huh-huh, oh yeah. He died, in particularly ignominious circumstances, on the toilet in his Memphis mansion, on August 16, 1977. He did, of course, make his only visit to the UK, alighting briefly at Prestwick Airport, in March 1960, which you’ll know if you’ve ever passed through the place and seen the memorabilia. But as a tribute, aka milking the dead superstar’s memory, this week sees all sorts of money-grabbing events at his Graceland home (stay at the 450-room guesthouse for prices starting at $299 a night) and empty your purse of the events, like the candlelight vigil. But if you can’t make it you can always shop online. What about the Elvis Rhinestone Embellished Socks at just $12.99 or the Elvis Silhouette Silver Sequin Strap Flip Flops for $19.99. Sadly, the Elvis Blue Hawaii Ukulele is sold out, although you can still grab the Direct From Graceland Elvis Presley Kenpo Patch Guitar, a snip at $699.

The Herald:

GETTING YOUR OATS REGULARLY

Obviously the way things are going over Brexit you’ll be stocking up on essentials, like pemmican, powdered eggs and shedloads of spam and baked beans. The survival foods list will be especially difficult for vegans and gluten-free trendies because top favourite drink and additive, oat milk, will be right off the menu. Although it has a shelf life of 50 days that probably isn’t long enough to wait out the coming storm. There has already been a run on the product because the inventors, the Swedish company Oatly can’t keep up with demand, and the price has surged. Apparently the manufacturing process involves chucking enzymes of some sort to liquify raw oat kernels, rather than a sturdy beast chomping grass. I don’t know what it tastes like but I’m told that it resembles the milk that’s left at the bottom of the bowl when you’ve finished you breakfast cereal. In which case, why not just do it the traditional way?

The Herald:

KNEES, NOSE AND BUMPS-A-DAISY

In the Diary of May 27 I wrote about a new company, Legal Matters, challenging Scottish Legal News in the marketplace. Martin Knight, MD of the new company, has asked me to point out that one of his previous companies, Cockney Knees-Up, didn’t collapse but was voluntarily wound up without trading. Martin wrote a biography of Charlie Cooke, so how could I refuse? I saw Charlie play his first match for Chelsea and have a great tale about him, but it’s probably libellous so I’ll leave it there.

Seventy-three years ago last Monday the Enola Gay dropped Little Boy on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, the inappropriately-named atomic bomb destroying the city and all but wiping out the population. Three days later another B-29 Superfortress dropped Fat Man onto Nagasaki, allegedly the wrong target. The two bombings killed at least 129,000 people, the majority of them civilians. There were commemorations of these hideous events all over Scotland, but not as many as in the past. And so it goes. As Kurt Vonnegut, who survived the allied bombing of Dresden by hiding in a meat locker, wrote in Slaughterhouse Five.

Enter Tsumoto Yamaguchi, a young engineer in his twenties on August 6, 1946. He was on a business trip to Hiroshima for his company Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and was stepping off a tram when the nuclear bomb exploded less than two miles away. The blast temporarily blinded him as well as inflicting horrific burns over his body. Next day, suffering from his wounds and from radiation poisoning, he made his way home.

Home, however, was Nagasaki and Yamaguchi was in his office explaining to his boss how he had almost been killed days before, when Fat Man went off. “Not even the sound of insects could be heard,” Nagasaki’s mayor said of the aftermath and with 70,000 dead all around. Miraculously Yamaguchi survived that one too, the luckiest man alive they called him, although equally you could say he was the unluckiest.