A very full agenda: suspensions, resignations, revolt turn SWP into SDP (Socialist Disintegration Party)
• Solidarity was the watchword in the SWP, but that was probably before the uproar over its failure to properly address allegations of sexual misconduct involving a senior official. Over the weekend, things have got much worse. "The SWP's national committee met on Sunday 7 July 2013 and voted by 26-6 to suspend four comrades and make wider moves to shut down any organised opposition to the party leadership," reads a statement signed by 165 comrades. "This move is a smokescreen. It is a deliberate attempt by the leadership to escalate the crisis rather than address the critical problems facing the party." Since the allegations gained wide circulation, the statement says, more than "400 people have resigned their party membership", the "overwhelming majority" of student members have walked, and more than 15 party workers have been sacked or resigned. Roll up, roll up. Watch the party implode.
• Some rejoicing within the BBC, meanwhile, after Friday's item about the travails of hard-working foreign correspondents suddenly supplanted by the arrival of world affairs editor John Simpson. One senior source reminds us of the solace apparently offered to a victim. "Consider this like a trip to the dentist dear boy. Undoubtedly painful, but over quickly."
• He was ever the plain speaker, but on other occasions, as we reported here, BBC types do resort to euphemism. Last week we told of the campaign to persuade them to describe waterboarding plainly as "torture" rather than the current description: a "harsh interrogation technique". Reflecting on their apparent reluctance to do so, we invited reader suggestions on other euphemisms for acts of state brutality. Philip Howells emails, full of ideas: stress positions re-imagined as "muscle definition therapy"; the rack – a "toning extension table"; and shock treatment, that's "electrical genital excitement". You don't work for the BBC, do you Philip?
• Ministers, meanwhile, try to get to grips with immigration. Tory peer Lord Selsdon attempts to discern the numbers. "The best way to do it is to ask the immigrants themselves," he tells fellow peers. "This morning I was woken up as usual by 11 Romanian builders. I complained to them that there was a chap at the end of the road who was one of those who sells you the gold ring that he drops on the ground. You pick it up and it has got '19' on it, and he says, 'Can you give me some money?' And you say: 'Are you an illegal immigrant?'" Presumably; taken aback, they confess. "All these immigrant groups, once they are established, become extraordinarily British," he says. "And they want to educate their children; above all, they want to see things bettered. If you are looking at televisions, audiovisual, it is the Caribbean that has the skills." He is quite the expert isn't he?
• Things are looking up for our Eurosceptic man of the moment, Professor Alan Sked, as he plots the creation of his new centre-left party to give Ukip a run for its money. With our help he's gaining traction. All that talk of almost nude dancing at student parties he organised doesn't seem to be damaging him at all. "Graham Stringer MP and David Nuttall MP have asked me to join the advisory council of the Democracy Movement", the all-party campaign that is being organised to pursue a "moderately expressed and well-researched campaign" for a no vote in any referendum, he tells us. The Greek United Popular Front has also been in touch. It has asked Sked to address a rally in Athens alongside Michael Moore, Noam Chomsky, and Naomi Klein etc. The Front wants to get Greece out of the euro and the EU. And if there's an after party, watch out.
• Finally, in light of the weekend's sporting development, some related reading. Where to start? Should it be "Why Andy Murray Will Never Win a Grand Slam", from the authoritative US website the Bleacher Report from October 2011. Or Tennis News, reporting the verdict of Russian ace Nikolay Davydenko "Nikolay Davydenko thinks that Andy Murray can never win a Grand Slam title." Don't rush, read both. Enjoy!
Twitter: @hugh_muir
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