A national treasure called Blair

WE woke yesterday to the news that Robin Williams was dead. If you switched on the radio and caught the tributes before you realised who they were talking about, you'd never have guessed the dead person was a Hollywood celebrity. They said he was kind, sweet and humble. There's not a lot of that in Tinseltown.

SO in the great scheme of things what should we worry about? Is it a) One silly Ukip politician telling young people to study Adolf Hitler's public-speaking technique or b) 20,000 people attending an anti-Israel rally in London and thus giving comfort to Hamas, whose aim is to finish the Holocaust that Adolf Hitler began?

MEANWHILE, tucked well away in the BBC's online coverage of Gaza is an analysis of those who have died. Virtually all the news coverage, closely overseen by Hamas, shows Palestinian children being rushed to hospital. I cannot recall footage of a single injured Hamas fighter. But having examined the statistics, the BBC reports a large proportion of males aged 20-40 among the dead and a much smaller percentage of women and children. The BBC's Head of Statistics Anthony Reuben comments: "If the Israeli attacks have been 'indiscriminate', as the UN Human Rights Council says, it is hard to work out why they have killed so many more civilian men than women." The implication is that Israel has been successful in killing large numbers of Hamas fighters. Like I say, it is well tucked away.

THAT national treasure Lionel Blair is celebrating 65 years in showbiz and admits he is hurt by occasional barbs, including the running jokes about him on I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue (Radio 4). Only a few weeks ago chairman Jack Dee quipped that when Lionel was born they broke the mould – just to be on the safe side.

THE language of public relations. A PR agency informs me that its client, a "leading" construction company, is building a new "cutting-edge" development that is both "state of the art" and will "kick-start" a new project, all in one paragraph. In time I dare say this new building will become at least landmark and probably iconic.

WAY back in June I described how a friend was selling his house and received an email from his solicitors, Doolittle, Snooze & Scratchbum, asking for the property's energy efficiency certificate. It took us laymen about five minutes on the internet to find the document that was apparently beyond the reach of a fully trained and highly paid law firm. This week, nine weary weeks on, the sale seemed to have gone very quiet. So my friend rang his solicitor to be told that the buyer's solicitors, Dither & Witless, wanted details of the building-regulations approval. This time it seemed the task was too big for two fully equipped firms of solicitors. Again, it took us amateurs less than five minutes to find the required document online. What exactly do solicitors do for their money? And why do they sign every letter "assuring you of our best attention at all times"?

THE latest wheeze from Whitehall is to get inheritance tax off people before they are actually dead by closing an assortment of tax-reduction schemes. How long before they start confiscating the pocket money of children before they start paying income tax? Better still, why not take all our money off us and give us a fiver a week spending money? Maybe I shouldn't put ideas in their heads.

WE had sweetcorn for lunch. How did people cope in the centuries between sweetcorn being discovered and dental floss being invented?