The 1950s – not lost but rejected

DESPITE the sacking of a BBC presenter, the unexpurgated 1932 version of The Sun Has Got His Hat On can still be found online via Google. Mind you, the European Court of Justice now says Google should recognise the "right to be forgotten" and remove search results that members of the public find awkward or embarrassing. We can probably look forward to a golden age when nothing nasty can be found and online searches reveal only nice things: Gordon Brown: finest economist of his generation. Tony Blair: peace-bringer to the Middle East. Adolf Hitler: popular European politician and champion of the toothbrush moustache.

ONE snag with the court's ruling on Google is that many of us share the same name. Thus, Google will tell you that "Peter Rhodes is a veteran BBC producer," "Peter Rhodes is a Chartered Psychologist," "Peter Rhodes is a London-based illustrator" and "Peter Rhodes is a waste of ink." Only one of these applies to me (no prizes) but am I entitled to have them all deleted?

WHEN it was announced that a new film was to be made of Dad's Army, there was much gnashing of teeth from those who believe the sheer brilliance of Dad's Army cannot be replicated. So it was worthwhile watching last weekend' s repeat The Two and a Half Fathers (BBC2) which was badly conceived, badly written., badly acted and painfully embarrassing. Some of the 80 episodes hit unforgettable heights of comedy and poignancy. And some were awful.

RICHARD Littlejohn's account of growing up in the 1950s is "Lost World," as though the land we knew 60 years ago has been accidentally mislaid. The truth is that we deliberately left it behind. Why? Because it was rubbish. No-one is forced to live a 2014 lifestyle. If you really want to recreate the magic of the 1950s, remove your central heating and double glazing, get rid of the car, swap your big TV for a nine-inch black-and-white Bush, share a loo with the people next door, have every holiday at Barmouth, get your teeth drilled without any painkillers and endure the interminable boredom of wet Sundays when absolutely nothing happens. The best that can be said about the 1950s is that they were better than the 1940s.

WE are told that Boko Haram, the name of the Nigerian terrorist group, means "Western education is forbidden." Haram is the Arabic word for forbidden which suggests the single word Boko means "Western education." But according to a BBC language expert, the name is a short form of a longer phrase and the meaning is implied. Strangely enough, Britain has an organisation with a very puzzling name. Special Air Service sounds like a courier company. It actually means "Lots of very hard men from Hereford are coming to kick seven sorts of **** out of you." Boko Haram may soon be in for a real education.

AS soon as Boko Haram issued its video of the kidnapped girls, intelligence experts began analysing every shadow, every fibre, every glance, every scrap of vegetation to figure out where and when it was filmed. To see this astonishing photo-analysis in action, catch the excellent 2006 Matt Damon spy yarn The Good Shepherd. In 1961 a brief clip of cine film is forensically dissected by the CIA, examining every detail from the ceiling fan to church bells and birdsong. The hunt is narrowed down to a single hotel room in Africa. If that's what the spooks could do with 1961 technology, what can they do now?

GUERILLA trivia. In 1967 Boko Haram did not record A Whiter Shade of Pale.