EDITORIAL
Since An Open Letter to James O’Brien from Country Squire’s Jamie Foster was published in this magazine on Monday it has been viewed 12,651 times.
Just this morning (and this follow-up is being published before breakfast on Tuesday) there have been a thousand more views of this letter. By the time James takes the microphone for Tuesday’s show, no doubt thousands more will have read it.
We are sure readers will agree that this letter is a polite, measured and gentlemanly missive which answers directly the question that James O’Brien asked a total of 18 times on his radio show on LBC on Monday:
“What don’t I get?”
James O’Brien is a highly educated and eloquent social commentator with a socialist leaning. The wise monks of Ampleforth, where James was educated, would no doubt be urging him right now to step down from his pulpit for a brief while and, as a gentleman, humbly address the letter and the large and increasing number of his loyal listeners who have read and approved of it; a significant chunk of his audience to whom he owes so much.
A “socialist leaning”? What defines a “socialist leaning”? I grew up in middle class comfort, had a share in a very successful small family business, elected to have a career in the public sector, retired to enjoy a reasonably comfortable lifestyle courtesy of a mix of private and publicly funded income, yet I despised Thatcherism and Bullyingdonism, and vote Labour.
O’Brien probably only got a chance to read the letter after his stint on LBC yesterday. Give him the benefit of the doubt. But since then it’s been mentioned by LBC’s Katie Hopkins and even discussed at length on Talk Radio by Ian Lee. O’Brien will respond.
James O’Brien should get Jamie on his show. Simples.