Bewigged buffoons
Taki
CO good to be in London, if only to get .,.3away from the Hillary Clinton publicity machine which has blanketed the Bagel. This shrewd and shark-like operator makes greedy Cherie look small time. Worse, I predict the book la Clinton didn't write will go straight to the top of the best-seller list. Eight million big ones for recounting eight million whoppers to some flunky: good work if you can get it. But even I thought it rather rude when a late-night comedian said that Chelsea is homely because Janet Reno is her father. Oy vett!
Mind you, I had hardly touched English soil when a friend got me all excited. 'If you print this it will cost you around ten million and a couple of years in the pokey,' was the way he put it. So here it goes: Which Member of Parliament belongs to the Magic Circle? This is a paedophile ring in Scotland, and its existence is causing mayhem in the upper circles of the Scottish mafia in Edinburgh. My informant, a person extremely well connected, assures me the you-know-what will soon hit the fan, but I doubt it. The bugger involved is much too smart. In fact he reminds me of Catherine the Great, who got rid of her husband Peter and then claimed he had died of haemorrhoids.
Actually, I am not eager to go back to court, although I won the last one big time. Yes, Mr Mohamed Fayed had to pay my costs as he had sued me and other backers of Neil Hamilton for maintenance. It was nice to finally win one — I had lost five straight — but believe you me, no poor person can win under this system. As was his right, Fayed dragged the case along for two years, appealing time and again all the way to the House of Lords. For trying to help a poor man (Hamilton) have his day in court against a rich one (Fayed), I faced costs of £200,000. Had I lost the case, and had Fayed been awarded costs, I would have faced a bill of half a million. Not bad for pledging £30,000 and being assured of anonymity. The system is diabolical. Only the rich can afford to go to court, and only the rich can defend themselves in court.
The Fayed case was a strange one. Five of my co-defendants, among whom were the Lords Hanson and Plymouth and the Duke of Devonshire, were advised by their lawyers that the poor little Greek boy had past differences with Fayed and might blow the case for them if we defended as one. So the poor little Greek was cast aside to fend for himself. As it happens, the aristos were right, my past squabbles with Fayed were
well known, and I did expect to lose, so you can imagine my surprise when I was rung up by Orlando Fraser and informed that the score was Taki 1, Fay-ed 0,
My having written in The Spectator that the presiding judge was 'a bewigged buffoon who could take his English justice and shove it' did not engender confidence. 'Not the smartest thing you've ever written,' said my brilliant solicitor Monte Raphael. Justice, however, did prevail, and for the foreseeable future bewigged buffoons are among my favourite people. After I lost the first big one 20 years ago, I was invited to Oundle school to address the law society. 'If the judge looks the type who would make love to his own wife in an orgy, settle immediately.' I advised them. This Sunday, I will be speaking at the Oxford Union on political correctness, but there will he no fireworks. The PC goons are everywhere and very determined to restrict freedom as well as other people's speech. In fact I will have to be extra careful because I shall be suffering from a terrific hangover. On Saturday evening I'm going to a ball at Fort Belvedere which promises to be the ball of the year, so if I do step out of line at Oxford. I can always blame the demon drink.
And speaking of the good life, there are worse ways to cross the Atlantic than on Terry Kramer's G-4. Nothing exemplifies the decline that has set in in almost every aspect of civilised living more than air travel. People dress like slobs and, worse, act like slobs. First class is no better, only roomier. People nowadays have absolutely no manners to begin with and, alas, the richer they are, the more arrogant. Concorde travel used to be a nightmare because of those who flew the fast bird. You know the kind: brutish CEOs, ugly Hollywood types, widowed old money bags. And English lager oiks. BA used to pack them in when the Concorde was empty, screwing people like me who had paid full fare. No. I think I'll stick with Terry's plane from now on.
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