This week I have mostly been reading...

...The Private Eye

To preempt anyone from getting the impression that I really do read nothing but comics I'll tell you about the fortnightly rag which I've subscribed to for about five years now.

The Private Eye is a satirical and current affairs "magazine" (magazine to me means glossy paper as standard, and the Eye is printed on stock one level up from newsprint so I don't class it as a magazine really) started in 1961. The current editor is Ian Hislop (one of the regulars on Have I Got News For You) and it has a reputation for mixing bold investigative journalist with immature humour. It's also always in the courts being sued over some story or another.

I began reading it during my debating phase in S2. Its style of humour appealed to me, since I was just getting into satire thanks to the gift of Dead Ringers cassettes. It took me a while to pick up the running jokes; for instance, fake articles are generally said to be "continued on page 94" (which doesn't exist, it's just an easy way of killing it once the satirical point has been made), and when I first read that I did look for page 94 only to be very confused. Also, every recurring company or person earns themself a nickname, most of them unpublishable in any other serious paper.

I learnt a lot of what I know about politics from the Eye, since what it excels at is drawing connections between events: an MP who behaves in a certain way may be anticipating a job on a related company's board, or their spouse might have a vested interest. The overall pattern which builds up is a mixture of sinister, self-serving inside dealing and pathetic incompetence.

My favourite parts are when there is an extended investigation into a specific topic, usually once a year or so. Once it was the £12bn NHS IT fiasco, another it was a thorough review of the Deep Cut case and the cover-up afterwards. There was also a brilliant article examining the Lockerbie Bomber story, printing information which I've never seen or heard from a mainstream news source, but which paints a radically different picture of the case. It's available to download here and is well worth a look (£5, or free for subscribers).

Next week: ...probably comics :P