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Prospects for Wednesday, 9 July, 2008

Stuart Denman | 10:21 UK time, Wednesday, 9 July 2008

Morning. Simon Enright is back in the hot seat for another turn as programme producer. Here's his morning e-mail to the production team. Do post your own ideas for tonight's programme below.

We have some strong material set-up but we are still looking for more. But the story that interests me most as a lead so far is the growing tension between Iran and Israel/US. We've had exchanges of threats and today we had a missile test. For the past 30 years relations have never been good but just how bad are things now?

We could, though, lead on the film we have from Shiraz Maher - former UK Islamist - who has been to Saudi to visit the "Betty Ford" clinic for terrorists. It is a jaw dropping story of how former terrorists - including an unsuccessful suicide bomber - are being "rehabilitated" in plush accommodation with a combination of PlayStation, Pepsi and ping pong. Is there an interview we should do off the back of this?

Michael Crick is in Haltemprice and Howden for another of his by-election special reports. The vote is tomorrow. And Steve Smith has an interview with Frank Gehry about his life in architecture and his first ever building in England - this year's serpentine pavilion. (NB He's built buildings in Britain before - the beautiful Maggie's Centre in Dundee.)

Are there other stories out there we should be chasing?

See you all at 10.30am.

Many thanks.

Simon

Comments

  • Comment number 1.

    Possible Scottish independence preparations?
    Status of extraordinary renditions?
    Talk to Searchlight on whether the far right has changed in the last twenty five years?
    Where will Gordon put the nuclear waste and will it be safe?
    Is the US missile defence system really for rogue states? I know the Russian "military-technical" statement does not mean air-strikes but ...
    Zimbabwe - how long will it take to get sanctions that bite into the ruling elites personal finances? I normally slag off our security services but they can use as much force as they like on any CIO operatives over here from Zimbabwe.

  • Comment number 2.

    The formula requires that each problem of the World be wrapped up in a few sprightly
    phrases?

    What is missing is a careful assessment of public opinion in Iran. According to reports in the Christian Sciece Monitor, the urban population is very much in favor of the West, but despises Bush and his policies.

    Pundits encapsulating the NeoCon line will completely miss this aspect and the concommitant opportunity to obtain a most valuable strategic ally in Iran.

    Can we view things from other than the Israeli Foreign Office line?

  • Comment number 3.

    who removed iranian democracy in the first place and imposed the shah? Based on the 'success' of that bit of Hollywood are the Neocons dreaming of a Shah 2?

    The people to interview are the official usa war gamers who proved there is no successful attack for the USA on Iran.

    The real threat to the uk is not iran but the neocons.

    ....


    More Davis tilting at windmills? Who will be his Sancho Panza?

    maybe he would be better off in the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ where you can get a pension of around £190,000 a year - more than the prime minister's salary. But lets sweep this under the big red bbc carpet....

  • Comment number 4.

    "Terrorism- Its cause and partial cure".

    This has been and is being studied intensively.

    The first problem is a definition (there being none that is generally accepted).

    One could have a look at it from different angles for many weeks.

  • Comment number 5.

    2

    snap!

  • Comment number 6.

    If you're going so predictably on US/Israeli plans to attack Iran, shouldn't you explain that this is just the latest concert party concocted by the Neo-Cons/Israeli Lobby and placed at the heart of British foreign policy. This follows on from the Iraq disaster, and runs up to and including, your recent regurgitation of the ridiculous Litvinenko pantomime.
    Perhaps in your quest for a fair over-view of the situation, you could examine what significance having people like Straw, Rifkind and Miliband in key positions has on the policies of this country, in the light of their links to Israel. And a comparison should surely be made of the nuclear weaponry and international-inspection of Israel and Iran, and of how even-handed 'British' policy has been towards these two countries. Naturally, these points won't be simply ignored, or pulled.
    Perhaps you could also explain why you've never examined these issues in the past.

  • Comment number 7.

    On the "Betty Ford" clinic for terrorists - it would be very interesting to get a serving military intelligence officer in say Afghanistan to comment on whether they think this is money well spent.

    I wonder if 40 Commando have a ping pong table out there?

  • Comment number 8.

    THE 'FAR RIGHT SMOKE SCREEN

    By asserting that criticism of hawkish, pro-Israeli policies plays to 'the far right' or that explication of demographic STATISTICAL improbabilities is conspiratorial or paranoid, just licences (usually covert) predatory abuses I suggest. All groups have to be monitored in the context of discrimination law, not only to ensure that no group is discriminated AGAINST, but also that they are not discriminated FOR after natural group differences are highlighted through research. Discrimination is dicrimination, and all too many miss this rather subtle/tacit aspect of altogether. We live in times where group differences and their implications are regularly being censored, and there's a very real risk that there some groups may be unfairly benefitting at the expense of other and campaign to preserve this advantage. Few complain that this is discriminatory because it doesn't fit their naive concept of anti-discrimination or 'equality'.



  • Comment number 9.

    Frank Gehry's Maggie Centre in Ninewells
    Hospital Dundee - just along the road - is
    indeed a gem! Opened by Sir Bob Geldof.

    You could also usefully take a look too at what seems to me to be another British
    Council scandal - this time close to home
    rather than in far-off Russia or Palestine:



    The paper trail is very interesting .......!

  • Comment number 10.

    At some point too your culture team may want to review the forthcoming Hadrian
    exhibition at The British Museum. This is
    quite well timed as Unesco has this week
    extended its Frontiers of the Roman Empire (United Kingdom and Germany) to take in
    Antonine's Wall in Scotland. Martha knows
    Latin, doesn't she? And Boris may have a view from Londinium worth exploring too?

    Another victory for the SNP .....................!
    The point about Ant's wall is that it failed!
    And Hadrian is also getting re-interpreted.
    There's also a Roman Legion in Blair Atholl.







  • Comment number 11.

    Come on SNP. Rock this useless Govt and opposition.

  • Comment number 12.

    "Martha knows Latin, doesn't she?"

    She might know Latin, but she doesn't appear to know any Greek. When introducing Harrison Birtwhistle's latest opera on Newsnight Review recently, she seemed to think the myth of the Minotaur had 'influenced' ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖr.

  • Comment number 13.

    If Deadtired digs into Graves (section 88 on Minos and his Brothers) he/she/it will find a
    footnote to the last sentence of his para (i)
    'For Zeus had appointed him [Alcmene who was married to Rhadamanthys in the Elysian
    Fields, after her death] one of the three Judges of the Dead; his colleagues were Minos and Aeacus, and he resided in the
    Elysian Fields' 'Footnote 14: Diodorus Siculus: v. 79; ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖr: Odyssey iv.564'.

    Line 564 of Book Four of The Odyessey cross-referenced by Robert Graves does
    not mention Minos by name but ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖr's
    press pass was probably checked by him/
    it before he filed his report for Women's
    Hour on the latest recipe using ambrosia
    and his hard news item for Newsnight BC?

    'Sources close to Menelaus report that he received a divine tipoff suggesting that it
    was not ordained that he should die and meet his fate in horse-pasturing Argos, but to the Elysian plain and the ends of the earth will the immortals convey him [cf:
    'extraordinary rendition'?] where dwells
    fair-haired Rhadamanthus, and where life is easiest for men. And now .... the weather:
    There is no snow on the Elysian plain, nor heavy storm, nor ever rain, but always Ocean sends up blasts of the shrill-blowing West Wind that they may give cooling to men .....And now for something different:
    Procrustean beds - torture or fair game?'

    Or maybe Martha just misread the opera
    programmes notes ......??

  • Comment number 14.

    ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖr Simpson maybe.

    It was the later 'Latins' that closed down the Philosophy schools so no wonder they are at a bit of a loss forever doomed to wander the labyrinth poor things.

    Plato's Phaedo has the story and according to Proclus the use of myth by Plato is a method of retellling of a dialogue by other means.

    In this case the myth is another way of talking about the spiritual discipline of 'going into the labyrinth'.

    Pierre Grimes PhD has unfolded this point of the labyrinth myth in the Phaedo which can be watched as a ytube wakingsoul playlist called 'The Sacred Myths of Plato: Phaedo' .



  • Comment number 15.

    I think the politics of the Hadrian exhibition at The British Museum sound very relevant:



    And not just because he was apparently gay
    which is probably what will get the headline.

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