Platell: still a hypocrite and just unbelievably lazy

If it's Saturday, it must be another feeble column from Amanda Platell in the Mail.

What does she write about today? Sex education in schools (covered in the Mail on 6 Nov), Fern Britton doing a religious chat show on BBC (covered in the Mail on 5 Nov), Drew Barrymore in a frock (covered in the Mail on 5 Nov), the U2 Berlin concert (covered in the Mail on 6 Nov), an attack on Helen Goodman over expenses (covered in the Mail on 6 Nov), Wayne Rooney celebrating the birth of his son until 6am (covered in the - gasp - Sun on 5 Nov), a sex discrimination case (covered in the Mail on 4 Nov), Gordon Ramsay's viewing figures (covered in the Mail on 5 Nov), an attack on Obama over Fort Hood (which appears to be straight from Fox News) and something about Slavica Ecclestone and the Dalai Lama (covered in the Mail on 4 Nov).

The only bit of her column that hasn't appeared somewhere else in the last three days is praise for Margaret Thatcher. And that can hardly be called 'new'.

Does she have an original thought in her head? And that doesn't include the lies. Any moron could flick through the papers, find a few stories to re-heat and add some unamusing insults.

And clearly, any moron does.

Let's start with Gordon Ramsay. She writes:

Ramsay's celebrity The F Word attracted just 1.8million viewers, with even BBC2's science series Horizon beating him with an aptly titled show called Who's Afraid Of A Big Black Hole? - into which we can all now hope the foulmouthed Ramsay will finally disappear.

If she feels that strongly about stopping media exposure for Gordon Ramsay, she should complain to the newspaper that just yesterday published five recipes from his latest 'brilliant book'. That would be the same newspaper she writes for.

On to her comments about Barack Obama, who she clearly hates. In recent weeks she has said he has no charisma and criticised Michelle for hula-hooping. And now? This about Obama's press conference - a few hours after the event and without all the facts - on the Fort Hood shootings:

He seemed very slow to react and spent much time initially ignoring the tragedy, thanking staff for organising a conference in Washington that he'd been attending.

It was only some time later that he spoke of the 'horrific outburst of violence'. His performance reminded me of President Bush's numb response when he was first told that two jet airliners had flown into the Twin Towers on September 11.

Now this is what really happened. He was indeed at a conference, as the BBC reported:

The first annual White House Tribal Nations Conference brings together one delegate from each of the 564 federally recognised American Indian tribes.

It is the first time in US history that they will all meet a sitting president.

So when Obama got up to speak he wasn't 'ignoring the tragedy' but thanking the organisers and attendees for this historic event. He gave a shout-out to a Congressional Medal of Honor recipient who was there, and gave a 'solemn guarantee that this was not the end of a process but the beginning of a process' on Native American rights.

What Platell calls 'much time' before he addressed Fort Hood was in fact - wait for it - 113 seconds.

When she claims it was 'only some time later that he spoke of the 'horrific outburst of violence'' was in fact 31 seconds into his remarks on the shootings and within three minutes of beginning his speech.

Not that the events on 11 September and at Fort Hood are comparable but Platell seems to forget Bush carried on reading 'The Pet Goat' for seven minutes after being told of the second plane hitting the World Trade Center. And then he went...where?

Is she really so pathetically biased that she thinks those two reactions are the same?

As usual, there are also some bitter attacks on women who are more successful and popular than she is. She refers to Fern Britton as:

The Big Fat Fibber

who was:

so unpopular with viewers that ratings for ITV's This Morning have soared since she was replaced as a presenter

Yes, the Mail (who else?) did report viewing figures have risen by 150,000 but how much of this is down to a new presenter and re-launched programme? And if she was 'so unpopular', how come she was presenting the show for eight years, and still managing to pull in nearly a million viewers?

But maybe with unpopular fibbers, it just takes one to know one...

And then there is a nasty and gratuitous attack on Drew Barrymore:

Drew Barrymore's appearance, wearing Posh's purple £1,750 Giral dress, made her look like a leading lady all right, but not the A-lister she hoped - more the poisonous cross-dressing Rosa Klebb in the James Bond movie From Russia With Love.

Aside from the factual error of calling Klebb a 'leading lady', this is what Drew looked like:


And this is Rosa Klebb:


Identical, as you can see.

The Mail, a few days earlier, had said Barrymore looked 'stunning' at the same event, although that might be to make up for stupidly saying she looked like a lapdancer the last time she was at a premiere.

But remember last week when Platell complained about Frankie Boyle's Rebecca Adlington joke as:

cruel, unfunny - and, above all, unjust.

Apparently, comparing the 34-year old Barrymore - whose recent directorial debut has been very well received - to a notoriously unattractive, 65-year old, poisonous, cross-dressing assassin, is totally just and completely hilarious.

Poisonous indeed.