... it was Rauschenberg's fellow student, John Cage, who had the major influence on him. Cage's 4 min 33 sec, the work which starts when the pianist raises the lid of the piano and finishes, without him having played a note, four minutes and 33 seconds later, has its parallel in Rauschenberg's white paintings. Not White On White like Malevich earlier in the century, but white, so that its only surface interest would be the shadows of passers by falling upon it, just as Cage's work was a collage of sounds from outside the concert hall (and, presumably, coughs within).

Richard Barnbrook of the British National Party has won a seat on the London Assembly - he spoke at City Hall.

British National Party
votes: 130714, votes %: 5.33%,
number elected: 1, change in number elected: 1

The far-Right party secured enough London-wide votes to pass threshold of around the five per cent of votes needed for a seat on the authority, which holds the mayor accountable for his ￡11 billion budget.

The BNP mounted a significant campaign in its attempt to penetrate the capital and will chalk up a seat as a major victory and a sign of support from the electorate at large.

Simon Darby, the party's deputy leader, said a seat on the London Assembly was "the icing on the cake", and the BNP's "equivalent of getting into the Premiership".

...

The BNP can attribute its success to strong results in several areas, including more than 12 per cent of the vote in Havering and Redbridge, almost 10 per cent of the vote in City & East, and six per cent in Ealing & Hillingdon.

It ran in third place overall in Havering & Redbridge and placed fourth and fifth in several other constituencies.

London Mayoral Election Results 2004
Ken Livingstone (Labour)
1st preference votes: 685,541 (35.7%)
2nd preference votes: 250,517 (13.0%)
Final: 828,380 (55.4%)

Steven Norris (Conservative)
1st preference votes: 542,423 (28.2%)
2nd preference votes: 222,559 (11.6%)
Final: 667,178 (44.6%)

When you lose four seats to the Socialist People's party of Furness, you really know you're in trouble. No, when you lose to Boris Johnson, you're really in trouble. When Cameron announced the Blond Oaf's candidacy all those months ago, we laughed. We thought this is ridiculous. OK, the Tories want to have some fun, make a splash but they know they can't win. But a combination of Veronica "Goebbels Knew Nothing" Wadley and Lynton "Say Nothing" Crosby has made this clown acceptable to half of London. Add in the national swing and he's unstoppable.

Any hope? Yes, a glimmer, it's the "London Takes One For The Team" strategy. There are, I have to admit, Labour activists who said, "No, let's not campaign against Boris. Let's allow him to win. And then the country will get a chance to see the real face of Toryism." Oh please, if nothing else, let it be so, please.

pronunciation of Bury by people from there is, in fact 'burry', as used by Sky news - rather than 'berry', as used by me. I am reasonably unsure about this, but since the person pointing it out could have me fired very easily, I am willing to capitulate. Anyone else who has an opinion on this, please do weigh in on the subject.

And the BBC have just pronounced Bury 'berry'.

Meanwhile about 10 polling stations in the north London borough of Barnet did not receive ballot papers until "some minutes" after the election began at 0700 BST.

In a statement, Barnet Council said it "sincerely apologised" to those voters affected but stressed all of the polling stations had opened on time.

（大勢が判明するのはいつになりそうだとか、三大政党の党首が投票を済ませたとかいったレポートのあとで、）一方、ロンドン北部のバーネット区の10箇所の投票所では、午前7時の投票開始から「数分」経過するまで投票用紙が到着していないというトラブルがあった。バーネット区では声明を出し、影響を受けた有権者に「心からお詫びします」としたうえで、すべての投票所が定刻にオープンしたと強調している。