Iannucci on the Lib Dem leadership race

By Stephen Tall | Mon 5th November 2007 - 9:33 am

Top satirist Armando Iannucci reported in yesterday’s Observer on the election fever which has taken grip of Washington DC:

Usually, America doesn’t really cover international news in the media, but this week the talk in Washington has been of one story and no other: the fight for leadership of the Lib Dems by Chris Huhne and Nick Clegg. The whole of the US has gone down with Lib Dem election fever. People have been coming up to me in the street and, when they hear my quaintly mild Scottish accent, have been saying to me: ‘Hey, are you from England? What’s the latest on those Lib Dem guys? You think Clegg has got it sewn up in the swing counties?’

Everywhere I turn, I see people wearing campaign buttons saying things like, ‘I’m A Huhne Goon’. Or ‘I Will Willingly Beg For Clegg’. And, to cash in, Sony Pictures has just announced a three-movie deal to start filming the dramatisation of the life of Menzies Campbell (though mostly concentrating on his time as an Olympic athlete).

Irony: so much more fun than reality.

6 Comments

wit and wisdom 5th Nov '07 - 1:12pm

No, Armando Ianucci has never knowingly been funny and this is no exception.
humder 5th Nov '07 - 4:22pm

Well, I found it very funny!
Doug 6th Nov '07 - 5:19pm

I always thought he was a Lib Dem. Didn’t he turn up at a Lib Dems in PR event a few years back?
Ross 7th Nov '07 - 2:38pm

Personally, I think Armando is excellent. Always makes me laugh (almost as much as “Bunnies”) – keep up the good work!
Terry Gilbert 7th Nov '07 - 3:08pm

I’ll have you know that Ming’s resignation made Washington Post! Albeit 2 sentences under World in Brief on Page A14….
Bonkalot Jones 7th Nov '07 - 3:50pm

Iannucci is fantastic – his rants in the Observer against the untrammelled evil which is Tesco have to be read to be believed.