Online
After the morning papers, I use the BBC website to access the rest of the papers online. I get the Financial Times and the New York Times by email. The FT is obviously good on business, and I like its comment page. because It often has a different take on national political news, supplemented by its FT Westminster blog. The NYT, for all its recent travails, is still the best American paper, though it's being pushed by the Wall Street Journal. And I read the News of the World online. When I was chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, I got hooked on it for professional reasons: so often we would receive complaints on a Monday, so I liked to get ahead of the curve by reading it on the Sunday. The blogosphere is essential. I love the Spectator Coffee House, for its own value and as an entry point for a whole bunch of other political blogs – Guido Fawkes, Iain Dale, Ben Brogan, FT Westminster, Clive Crook from the FT because he talks so well about America, Nick Robinson, Adam Boulton and many others including Red Box at the Times. The blogosphere has made me go to bed an hour later! Realclearpolitics.com brings together a digest of all the best articles on politics to be found in the United States and occasionally has British articles too. It's indispensable.
Newspapers
Coming through the letterbox each morning are the Times and the Daily Mail. On Sundays it's the Sunday Times and the Mail on Sunday. The Times is a good all-round newspaper, they are going through a good patch, with an excellent website. And I always want to know what the Mail is campaigning for, because the politicians pick up on it. I especially like the Mail's football coverage too.
Magazines
The Spectator has still got the edge – just as good under Fraser Nelson, its new editor. I've been reading Private Eye from its very first edition in the 60s. I read the New Yorker for the features and film reviews.And the New York Review of Books – I've been a subscriber since 1989 – is one of the great intellectual triumphs of the western world. It has brilliant stuff on foreign affairs.
TV
I find myself watching less and less television, I just tend to record on Sky and watch later on. I watch news much less than I used to, as I get such a surfeit of it from the net, so I'm not a regular bulletin watcher, though, of course, I like to watch Newsnight for the punch-ups when [Jeremy] Paxman is on. I love the Daily Show with Jon Stewart: makes me laugh like a drain. But I also love TV drama, and here the Americans kick our asses – The Wire is beyond brilliant. Also police drama like The Shield, and I think what you get in these shows is repertory acting by an ensemble of not very well known but strikingly good actors. And Question Time, it's terrific, after all the hoo-ha with Nick Griffin, people were saying it's tired and I don't get that, it's a classic format of panel and audience and how they interact. And the very simplicity of it all makes the format a permanent pleasure. And Have I Got News for You – what I particularly like is the death-seat next to Paul Merton, no-one stands a chance of keeping up, no-one's quicker than Paul Merton. How many desperately unfunny people have died in that seat?
Radio
BBC Radio 4's flagship programmes like Today, World at One, PM: it's worth paying the licence fee just for them.
Books
I'm going through a phase of American police dramas. I've just read two fantastic ones which transcend the genre: True Confessions by John Gregory Dunne and American Tabloid by James Ellroy. I've read everything Elmore Leonard has ever published, and there's only ever been two other contemporary authors I've wanted to do that with: William Boyd and the other is Alan Furst.
Music
Mostly I listen to music on my crosstrainer, on the oldest ipod in the world. At the moment it has Little Richard, AC/DC, and my one concession to contemporary music is the Swedish rock band, The Hives.
Getting Our Way by former Ambassador to the United States, Christopher Meyer, is published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, price £18.99. He is also presenting the companion BBC TV series of the same name, which will be broadcast in February 2010 and is produced by Wingspan Productions.
