As I said in a brief talk, about this time last year, as part of the BBC/Sage Gateshead Free Thinking Festival, "If you are not American, don't Americanise, for the love of our world being multicultural" - quickly stressing the difference between being anti-American and anti-Americanisation, of course.

And this year, by the way, at 3.30 on Saturday at the Sage, my brief talk will be: "Cut Capitalism."