TV pundits that think they know it all

John McCririck, the C4 horse racing pundit who stood up at Robin Cook's funeral and decided to lambaste the prime minister for not being there!  Now, I may be no great fan of Blair or Cook for that matter but lets look at this a minute.

We all know that Blair and Cook had serious differences of opinion, in fact Cook walked out on Blair at a time when he needed him most but then again in fairness the man did so because he believed he could not support Blair's war in Iraq.  Fair enough.  However, lets not simply assume Blair has "snubbed" Cook, Blair is after all the Prime Minister - a 7 day a week, 24hr a day job. Like him, his policies or not, he is in effect the most important man in the UK tasked with the most difficult of jobs.

Given some of what he has had to attend to recently (Iraq, G8, London bombings etc), isn't it reasonable to allow him a few days "off" with his family?  I'm sure if there had been a serious matter to attend to he would have packed his suitcase and returned to the UK but a funeral for an old colleague, get it into perspective!  Do you really think Cook cares, or his family for that matter? Could you imagine the extra stress it would have caused them if Blair had turned up? The extra security etc?

Now to Mr McCririck, do you really think a TV "bookie" who, lets remember, gave a "sterling performance" in a recent reality TV programme i.e. showed what he was really like; a guy who can't even dress himself properly and wears his grannies jewellery and takes the huff when he doesn't like what's going on round about him, should we really be subject to this sort of man's ramblings?

It's about time these so called celebrities stuck to their own area of "expertise" and kept their mouths shut.  More importantly, the media should stop giving them a platform from which to speak.  But equally these "celebs" should know themselves when to shut it.  I mean, lets face it, he was asked to speak at the funeral of his friend, a difficult thing to do but also a great honour. Do you really think he needed to take advantage of this and try to make some sort of political hay at a time when what most decent people would have done would be to say some soothing words to help the family of the deceased?

What a way to remember a man who has been described as one of the greatest modern day politicians!