Ghastly man to leave Today programme

[Fambo Number Mive]

The ghastly John Humphrys has left the Today programme.

His final programme had Tony Blair, David Cameron and Dame Edna. I don't know how Dame Edna kept her breakfast down having to face those three nauseating people.

Dame Edna penned a poem that said: "You won't grow old, you'll just get nicely mellow/So hug your trees, play Elgar on your cello."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-49752274

A reminder why Humphrys is so awful:

...The programme, which aired on BBC2 at 9pm, put forward the contentious idea that Britain was going through an "age of entitlement". In it Humphrys interviewed claimants, including a couple on £1,600 of benefits a month who thought "living on benefits an acceptable lifestyle", and welfare experts, from centre-right thinktanks and from the United States, which runs a much tougher public assistance system.

Following a complaint from the Child Poverty Action Group charity and another unnamed individual, the BBC Trust decided the subject met its criteria for being a "controversial subject" and a "major matter". The complaint was decided on by the five-strong editorial standards committee, composed of five BBC trustees.

Significantly the committee found that the programme had not backed up its controversial views with statistics and that this, said the trust, had led to the programme being inaccurate.

In a blunt assessment, the trustees found "the absence of sufficient complementary statistical information to underpin contributors' accounts, viewers were left unable to reach an informed opinion and the accuracy guidelines had been breached"...

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/jul/30/bbc-welfare-reforms-impartiality-john-humphrys

[Famous Mortimer]

It'd be nice if the BBC would stop hiring fairly open Tories to host their flagship political shows.

[Fambo Number Mive]

There's even an article on the BBC News site (which is meant to be impartial) saying how wonderful Humphreys is.

[jobotic]

He's had a go at Corbyn for not appearing on Today for three years, because it's such an important programme.

Wonder why he hasn't you fucking Tory toady.

[Cuellar]

Bye mate

[NJ Uncut]

Wish he left it Yesterday, eh, readers?

[EOLAN]

Ta-ra yer shitter.

[Replies From View]

The ghastly John Humphrys has left the Today programme.

His final programme had Tony Blair, David Cameron and Dame Edna. I don't know how Dame Edna kept her breakfast down having to face those three nauseating people.

Isn't Dame Edna played by a man named Humphrys?  Humphry Humphrys maybe?  I wonder if perhaps Dame Edna has always been played by John Humphrys and this show was his opportunity to do one of those Alan Ayckbourn style hilarious farces of having to constantly excuse himself for a shit to go back and forth between his ghastly true self and his shrieking Australian counterpart.

How were the ludicrous glasses depicted on the radio?  Normally they'd have a narrator or another character saying "SHE IS SOMEHOW NOW DRINKING LILT THROUGH THE FRAME OF HER INTOLERABLY WACKY SPECTACLES.  OKAY AND WHILE I WAS SAYING THAT SHE STOPPED."

[Psmith]

I've been missing him for years.It's hard to throw a brick from here,(Thankyou PGW)
He had a lovely brother who did the sport on BBCWales,sadly now deceased.Fate can make mistakes at times.

[Jockice]

Isn't Dame Edna played by a man named Humphrys?  Humphry Humphrys maybe?  I wonder if perhaps Dame Edna has always been played by John Humphrys and this show was his opportunity to do one of those Alan Ayckbourn style hilarious farces of having to constantly excuse himself for a shit to go back and forth between his ghastly true self and his shrieking Australian counterpart.

How were the ludicrous glasses depicted on the radio?  Normally they'd have a narrator or another character saying "SHE IS SOMEHOW NOW DRINKING LILT THROUGH THE FRAME OF HER INTOLERABLY WACKY SPECTACLES.  OKAY AND WHILE I WAS SAYING THAT SHE STOPPED."

I'd just like to say here that I find Dame Edna completely - nay spectacularly - unfunny. As is the other one Barry Humphries does. Les Pattinson or whatever he's called.

[checkoutgirl]

A reminder why Humphrys is so awful

I need more.

[Fambo Number Mive]

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/media/2018/01/definitive-list-sexist-things-john-humphrys-has-said

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/david-davis-john-humphrys-dancer-punch-wife-today-bbc-radio-4-a9074196.html

Some more examples

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

I remember most of those individual occasions but jesus, what a collection. Sure, there may be individual bits of context unfairly missing but it becomes overwhelming. That paints a picture of an absolutely revolting piece of shit.

Revoltingly over-paid too.

I hope an abyss emerges beneath his gravitational field.

[holyzombiejesus]

Eurgh. Just read a bit of his shitty autobiography in the mail. What a horrible wanker. It reads like one of those stories in Viz where someone tells their hard-luck story but they're obviously an odious cunt.

Look at his horrible face. It looks like he's put a layer of PVA glue on his face and forgot to peel it off.

[Fambo Number Mive]

...During the interview, which also included cosmologist Carlos Frenk, Humphrys asked: "One wonders a bit I suppose because you scientists, I've heard it said, can be a little bit competitive with each other, just occasionally.

"I wonder whether he was ever, or if it was ever said of him in your profession, that he was cut a bit of slack because he was so desperately disabled but fought through it?"

"No absolutely not," Cox replied.

"He said himself, I think, that the realisation that he might not have long to live - as you said in your introduction - stimulated him to look more deeply into physics and give his life to physics, essentially."...

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/john-humphrys-stephen-hawking_uk_5aa910e7e4b001c8bf159982

I was on the Today programme this morning to discuss a report, written by Howard Reed of Landman Economics for a group of childrens' charities, called "In the Eye of the Storm", about the impact of tax and spending change on "vulnerable children and families".John Humphrys began by asking me what the report showed. I said that it showed that, not surprisingly, tax rises and benefit cuts, combined with cuts to public services, were likely to disproportionately affect the poorest.    I expected - evidently naively - that to be a prelude to a more detailed discussion of the analysis in the report and the implications. We never got to the report itself; instead, Humphrydd asked:

"surely it isn't the case that benefits are being cut for the poorest? There are benefit cuts yes, but mostly they're caps on the higher limits, on the top limits"
You can listen to it all (only three minutes) here. [begins at 2h 57min].  It is clear that Humphries really is under the impression that cuts to welfare benefits will not impact the poorest or genuinely disabled people.

But, as everyone who has ever worked on or researched welfare or social security policy knows, this is complete fantasy. Of course benefit cuts disproportionately affect the poorest, because, by and large, benefits go to poor people.  ONS figures here show that for non-retired households, benefits make up more than 45% of the gross income of the lowest quintile (the poorest fifth); but only about 1.5% of the income of the top quintile.  So the fact that benefit cuts will hit the poorest hardest is not because those cutting the welfare budget have chosen to pick on the poor; it is simply an inevitable result of cutting working-age benefits (pensioner benefits, of course, have largely been left unscathed)...

https://www.niesr.ac.uk/blog/explaining-benefit-system-john-humphrys

[Twed]

His health is probably failing which is great news.

[buttgammon]

In an attic somewhere, there's a picture of him that looks even more hideous.

[imitationleather]

His health is probably failing which is great news.

I was thinking how old and fucked he looks is the best part of this entire story.