Why oh why are more and more BBC reporters pronouncing 'comrade' as 'COM-rad', as if it were French or German or Russian or something, rather than the well-established 'COM -r'd' (which is what the Oxford English Dictionary gives' or 'COM- raid'? I heard it again on the news this lunchtime, in the context of WWII bomber crews. Do others find it as irritating as I do?