Simon Hoggart
Simon Hoggart
Simon David Hoggartwas an English journalist and broadcaster. He wrote on politics for The Guardian, and on wine for The Spectator. Until 2006 he presented The News Quiz on Radio 4. His journalism sketches have been published in a series of books...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionJournalist
Date of Birth26 May 1946
less regard suspect uniquely writers
We all have our opinions. But I suspect that writers are actually less worth heeding, because they regard themselves as so uniquely important, so culturally sensitive.
applaud equally expect extreme fact form hold move people rejected somehow views
When people move from one extreme set of views to embrace another equally batty picture of the world, they expect us to applaud their choice, as if the fact that they have rejected one form of nuttiness somehow validates the screwball views they hold now.
above air believe both british business hence line manchester revolves richard route taken train
'Sir' Richard Branson may be the Julian Assange of British business, in that both believe the world revolves around them. Hence Branson's decision to set up an air service between Manchester and London, above the route of the train line that's been taken from him.
childhood country government history second
She is the first head of government in history to give a whole country its second childhood.
expensive hold modest palace pleased provide providing royal wines
Corney & Barrow are proud to have the royal warrant, meaning that they provide the Palace with some of the greatest - and necessarily most expensive - wines from around the world. I am pleased to say that they also hold my own warrant, for providing exceptional wines at - surprisingly - modest prices.
buy faith fascinated love people
Americans are fascinated by their own love of shopping. This does not make them unique. It's just that they have more to buy than most other people on the planet. And it's also an affirmation of faith in their country. . .
seems
That is writing with balls, it seems to me.
arrogant destroyed health lack lives odious people proper sight trying whose
All over the U.S. there are people whose lives are being destroyed for lack of proper health care provision, and there is no sight more odious than the rich, powerful and arrogant trying to keep it that way.
lines poverty firsts
Until now their line has been that the Tories are incapable of doing anything about poverty, and aren't interested in doing it in the first place. By contrast, Labour says, we are also incapable of doing anything about poverty, but would dearly love to do something. If we knew what.
dream blood liberty
Reagan was a flesh and blood version of any other mute national emblem, say the Statue of Liberty. Everyone knows what she represents, but no one would dream of asking her opinion.
children air parent
Disney World has acquired by now something of the air of a national shrine. American parents who don't take their children there sense obscurely that they have failed in some fundamental way, like Muslims who never made it to Mecca.
optimistic mean white
Curiously, it is hard not to be a little optimistic about the future for Zimbabwe (as nobody at all calls it yet, except in political speeches). The fear is not that there will be mass slaughter of the whites, followed by their flight to South Africa and the collapse of the economy, but that the need to retain white confidence may mean that the blacks are badly disappointed.
retirement jobs mean
Reagan is the only man to take the presidency as a part-time job, a means of filling up the otherwise empty hours of retirement.
men daylight broads
Peter Mandelson is the only man I know who can skulk in broad daylight.