I noted it mentally at the time but let it pass. However, Call me Dave’€™s remarks last night brought it to mind again.

His posturing over Georgia would have gone beyond recklessness if it were to be repeated in office. [I have to say here that David Milliband was as bad back then. Don’€™t they have advisers who know about this stuff?]

But not only did Call me Dave get it wrong over Georgia and thereby possibly antagonise Russia, he now wants to target nuclear weapons on Iran and China. Note Nick Clegg’€™s startled reaction in the clip.

Iran!

Iran which does not have nuclear weapons (any more than Iraq had: anyone with knowledge of the Middle Eastern psyche knows what I’€™m talking about here) and which therefore our threatening them with amounts to bullying. And nobody likes a bully.

And China!

China: with whom we have no quarrel and which has more than enough capacity to make ours seem piddling and which, therefore, it makes no sense to threaten.

Quite apart from the fact that the UK most likely can not or will not use its nuclear weapons without prior US approval and we probably only have them because the French do too (as Yes, Minister put it once) what on Earth was he thinking? Or did he just let his mouth run away with him?

Either way such talk is dangerous and does not bode well for the country’€™s international relations under a Call me Dave premiership. For you can be sure the relevant authorities in Moscow, Tehran and Beijing (not to mention elsewhere) will have taken due note. Mehdi Hassan in the New Statesman makes much the same point.

So, Dave, I’€™m not going to call you Dave.

I’€™m going to call you irresponsible.

2002-2003.

This wasn’t a Christmas present but a loan from our not-quite-daughter-in-law. (It seems a bit ridiculous to call her our son’s girlfriend as they’ve been together for years and she’s now a grown woman rather than a teenager. Plus she feels like part of the family.)

The West Wing is slick and fast moving entertainment, well acted and engaging. However, watching the episodes in close succession probably shows up the flaws more than its designed weekly exposure would.

From a story telling perspective I noted the ever more inventive stratagems for dumping information on the viewer, most of which in written fiction would be regarded as clumsy.

[The British equivalent, Yes, Minister, got round this problem by assuming the Minister was ignorant – which is not unwarranted; Her Majesty’s Secretaries of States’ average time in post is measured in months rather than years; leaving them just enough time to muck things up before moving on to a new Department, where again they have to learn the ropes from scratch. US presidents – we shall ignore here Reagan, the second Bush and Calvin Coolidge – and their staffs are generally thought to be more rounded, however.]

In The West Wing, though, characters claim lack of knowledge so that they (and we) can be lectured. Strange enthusiasms are adumbrated. At a Town Hall meeting events inside the West Wing are related. (Don’t they have an Official Secrets Act?) We also have people acting in ways they surely would not, or having relationships that are unlikely solely for the purposes of story (arc.)

The series is, of course, revealing of the political system in the US – which undoubtedly has its strangenesses. At one point a husband seemed to have inherited his deceased wife’s place in Congress – at least until an impending election. In a close situation his was the crucial vote! If that’s what does happen when a Congressperson dies it’s a bizarre arrangement.

The programme is above all, though, an exercise in allowing Americans to feel good about themselves, which can be a bit off-putting. (There may be better angels in their nature but they quite often keep them hidden.)

The cliff hanger ending to the first series was a blow.

It means I’ll have to watch series 2, now.

Though I would have anyway.