Over the weekend, two titans of British political radio faced off on Twitter – in the blue corner was Mike ‘concrete growing‘ Graham and in the red corner was James ‘boisterous boozer‘ O’Brien. In a now deleted tweet, Graham accused O’Brien of being a “paedo apologist and a plank” – James responded by threatening legal action. Co-conspirators may have thought that Graham was referring to James O’Brien’s promotion of convicted child abuser Carl Beech’s now discredited allegations. For which James still hasn’t apologised.

The whole affair did remind Guido of an “astonishingly illuminating” discussion James previously had on LBC. In a sensitive heart-to-heart, James questioned a man called John who spoke of his paedophilic desires. Over the course of the interview, O’Brien praised John’s “breath taking” courage, said he should take “pride” for not acting on his fantasies. He also compared John resisting his desires to a husband resisting the urge to cheat and agreed there should be less stigma around offering psychological help. Co-conspirators can watch the full phone-in here.