A reader writes:
Wow, it seems like Andrew picked both the best and the worst time to be in England away from the blog. I look forward to his comments upon his return.
Another writes:
After being absent with bronchitis during a Middle East revolution, that's twice in a row. Coincidence? I don't know. But if it happens a third time, I'm going to starting thinking that Andrew goes off to activate his magical powers.
Then there was taking a vacation when Benazir Bhutto was shot, or trying to quit the blog entirely the week before the current Pontiff was elected. D'oh! But having a ringside seat to the scandale des hacks has certainly compensated for being off the grid. It is a very British scandal, arguably the best since Swinging London gave us the Profumo Affair (although sex, tragically, is missing). And one aspect of its Britishness is the fact that vast numbers of Brits don't give a toss. There was a slightly hilarious episode of Newsnight last week – along with Channel 4 News, the media crack of the chattering classes here – when a focus group of typical Brits were assembled to offer an opinion on the matter. Despite the frantic efforts of the hosts, all they could whip up was apathy, and blank Homer-Simpson-like stares. What was said at the Christmas party between David Cameron and Rebekah Brooks about Andy Coulson does not seem to have garnered much frenzy outside Islington. I find my eyes glazing over a bit as well.
But it's also a sharp reminder of the nature of the British elite. Two decades after Thatcherism, it hasn't changed much. I've lived in America for twenty-five years, and yet I can come home as a native son and personally knew at college the current Mayor of London (an Oxford Union successor), the Foreign Secretary (an Oxford Union predecessor), the editor of the Economist (Magdalen history), and from Reigate Grammar School, the director of strategy at Number 10, the director of public prosecutions and, last but not least, Fatboy Slim. And the number of invites to parties I used to get at Oxford, and the necessity to attend, and the intensity of the cliques, must only have intensified. The nexus of Rebekah and James and George and Andy and David is instantly recognizable. As is the mix of polite chit-chat and journalistic savagery that is brewed at Oxbridge and gently simmered for the rest of everyone's lives. So much about Britain has changed – but Private Eye is eternal.
All of which is to say I'll be blogging from London this week – so, pull up a chair and let the circus begin.
The Dish 