Someday We'll Look Back On This Moment

For Years, We've Grown Dependant On American Consumers As The World's Spenders Of Last Resort. They've Kept Europe Out Of Recession, Allowed China To Industrialise, And Prevented Global Deflation. But At The Same Time, They've Not Been Looking After Their Own Futures.

We All Know That Americans Love Their Statistics - In Sport, Obviously. And In Finance Too.

As It Happens, I Have Personally Been Something Of An Enthusiast For The London Olympic Games, Mainly On The Grounds A) That A Bit Of Wasteland Will Be Made Nice And B) That It Tends To Make Everybody Happy That Their Country Should Be The Centre Of World Attention For A Couple Of Weeks In Their Life.

Now I Can Broadcast To An Audience Of Several Million People On The 'today' Programme. I Can Talk About The Day's News. But On Radio, Believe It Or Not, We Have Notes And Scripts. And While We Might Ad Lib The Odd Wryly Amusing Asides, They Come At The Frequency Of A Suburban Bus. About One Every 90 Minutes.

What Comes With A Job As A Staff Member Of The Bbc Is A Certain Self-censoring That You Get Utterly Used To. You Don't Say Everything You Think. You Hold Back On Some Things.