10 O'Clock Live

Channel 4 launched 10 O'Clock Live last night with excellent timing, broadcasting as it did just hours after Alan Johnson's resignation. It is being pitched as their answer to the USA's Daily Show, although it is a pity that that series has now been curtailed on More 4 to one episode a week. The Guardian's review noted that it received an immediate avalanche of criticism on Twitter, but that the show had some long term promise! Did you watch it? What did you think? Please let us know.

9/11

Channel 4's programme 9/11: State of Emergency was an appropriate reminder of just how devastating the attacks were on 9/11 to the USA's feeling of security at the top level and the personal tragedies and survival for those ordinary people caught up in what was the USA's worst terrorist attack. Watch it on Channel 4 OD. Particularly revealing are Condoleezza Rice's comments. As National Security Adviser she was crucial to the response and her interview is fascinating for the processes put into action (Cold War links here abound) and the chaos that was unleashed at the heart of the world's most powerful government. If you watch it, please add your own comments.

PS: Here is the angry analysis of the consequences of 9/11 by the Independent's Robert Fisk. This extract from his conclusion shows his point of view pretty clearly:
"Anniversaries are newspaper and television events. And they can have an eerie habit of coalescing together to create an unhappy memorial framework. Thus do we commemorate the Battle of Britain – a chivalric episode in our history – and the Blitz, a progenitor of mass murder, to be sure, but a symbol of innocent courage – as we remember the start of a war that has torn our morality apart, turned our politicians into war criminals, our soldiers into killers and our ruthless enemies into heroes of the anti-Western cause."

Jon Snow and Zac Goldsmith

Jon Snow and Zac Goldsmith (Conservative MP for Richmond) had a pretty heated discussion about Goldsmith's campaign expenses on Channel 4 News last Thursday. You can see the interview and Channel 4's reaction to it here. According to the Guardian, "Goldsmith accused Snow of telling viewers "deliberate and outrageous" lies and warned Channel 4 News to "watch it" during a finger-wagging 13-minute appearance. At one point Goldsmith – who has the backing of the Conservative party over the allegations – leaned over the desk and pointed at Snow, protesting: "You are being a charlatan on this.""

Here is Goldsmith's response from his website. What's your opinion on all this?

The Great Fire of London

Here is a fascinating article about the Great Fire of London, which was the subject of a Channel 4 documentary yesterday. Most people are familiar with the basic story -that the fire began in Thomas Farriner's bakery in Pudding Lane and was then spread rapidly across the city by a strong wind after a hot summer. However, the context is less known. England was at war with France and the Netherlands at the time and only weeks earlier the Royal Navy had deliberately set alight the Dutch city of West Terschelling. The majority of the people in London therefore assumed the Great Fire was a deliberate act of arson, and angry mobs sought out foreigners in the city to seek their revenge - a Frenchwoman was attacked because people thought the baby chicks she carried in her apron were fireballs.

The authorities believed the fire was an accident, but in September a French watchmaker confessed to starting the fire with 23 conspirators. His confession was deeply flawed but he was eventually hanged. Later it was discovered he was at sea at the time and people returned to the theory it was an accident. This did not stop the London Monument to the fire (Still standing close to London Bridge - see map below) from carrying a plaque blaming the Catholics for the fire. This was eventually removed in the 19th Century. Meriel Jeater, curator at the Museum of London, suggests that the paranoia shown after the Fire must have been very similar to how people must have felt after terrorist outrages like 9/11 and 7/7, and that human nature has changed very little in the meantime...

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