Blank Page No.5

We’ve the all-star line-up of Steve in the States and ZK in Singapore at the controls of this weekend’s Blank Page. Steve as moderator? Poacher turned game-keeper I’d say. I’m looking forward to it.

Can a country ever re-brand itself?

Austria’s reputation has suffered a battering over the past week because of the Josef Fritzl incest scandal. Now the Austrian Chancellor, Alfred Gusenbauer, has said his government plans to launch a campaign to rectify the damage done to the country’s image.  But how can  a country re-brand itself? Denmark went on a PR drive after the Muslim cartoon scandal. In the past Belgium has had its image damaged by child sex scandals….but how can a country recover from such bad press?

Welcome Mr Medvedev

Hi, I’m Jon. I’ll be working on the World Today this Sunday morning.  With Dmitry Medvedev set to become Russia’s new president this week, if you could pen a greeting card to Mr Medvedev for his big day, what would you write? And what farewell message would you give for Vladimir Putin?

On air: Why do you care about certain issues, and not about others?

As one US blogger puts it, we know what’s happening in Iraq, we know about Darfur, but how many of us know or care about DR Congo? You could argue it’s a fair point. More people have been killed by conflict in DRC than any other in the past ten years. So why the relative indifference? We’re not trying to guilt trip you here and say ‘look at these things that you should care about’. We all have a limit to the issues, peoples and places we can support whether with our time or our money. We’re just trying to understand why some causes gain mass support and others don’t.

In the spirit of openness…

We feature on this blog, again today, questioning our practices. I’ve posted there, but i think we can be a bit clearer on air about the contributors you hear. Regulars and readers of the blog know how we put the programme together (and it’s explained here ), but for our listeners only, we’ll be a bit more explicit.

Talking points for 2 May

Good morning, the big story today is Condoleezza Rice’s trip to London and the Middle East. Here’s the State Department transcript of her briefing to reporters on the flight over. This is what stood out for me:

It also helps if the international community actually pays its pledges to improve the lives of the Palestinian people. So it’s not just a matter for Israel, although, obviously, Israel has a very important responsibility, probably the lead responsibility, in helping to improve the lives of the Palestinian people. But it’s a shared responsibility. And by the way, it’s a responsibility that is shared by the Palestinian leadership itself.

Do you agree with her assessment of the responsibilities for improving the life of Palestinians?