Boris to bloggers: time to button up

The Mayor of London remains unapologetic about the Olympic jacket buttons fiasco that so outraged bloggers in China.

“I saw that my fellow performers all had their jackets done up, and so did my charming Beijing counterpart, Mayor Guo,” Boris Johnson writes of the closing ceremony in The Spectator.

“I reached instinctively for my middle button and then thought, sod it. I checked with the chap from the International Olympic Committee, and no, there is no Olympic jacket-button protocol.

“Open or shut: it’s up to you. I was going to follow a policy of openness, transparency and individual freedom. No disrespect intended. It’s just that there are times when you have to take a stand.”

“Sick of Barack Obama” screams a popular thread on the BBC’s message board. One sceptic complains: “Do we really need to know what he has been doing every day?” Another writes: “The BBC seems to forget that John McCain is also a candidate.” We are assured that balance will be restored in Minnesota next week.

Tom Cruise remains optimistic about Valkyrie, his troubled film about Claus von Stauffenberg’s failed plot to assassinate Hitler in 1944. “We got hold of a uniform, I put it on and it was like I immediately felt OK. We’re gonna tell this story,” he told Total Film. Von Stauffenberg’s son maintains: “It’s bound to be rubbish.”

Loyal son Jack Osbourne is doing his bit to restore Ozzy’s reputation. “I think [the MTV reality series] The Osbournes . . . tarnished the public’s perception of my dad as a bit of a senile, funny, bumbling guy,” he tells RollingStone.com. “Yeah, my dad can be that guy, but it’s not him. My dad’s not an idiot – he’s nothing short of a genius.” Jack’s solution? A new documentary about his dad and an Ozzfest “travelling museum”.

Postscript

Ae Fond Kiss and Tam O’Shanter by Robbie Burns have been recorded in their musical forms by Michael Jacksonand David Gest. “Michael and I were originally going to do a musical on his life with Gene Kelly directing and Anthony Perkinsas producer,” Gest said, “but they both died”. He added: “Michael and I think of Burns as one of the most brilliant minds ever.” This of the poet who was dismissed recently by Jeremy Paxman as “a king of sentimental doggerel”.

Got a story to tell? people@thetimes.co.uk

Times Recommends

• One case exposes grim reality for thousands
• A glass case: Prince who yearns for action
• Elizabeth Gaskell: I won’t see out the year