London Scottish (1914)

The war memorial in my hometown, a place of no more than 6,000 people today, lists the names of no fewer than 292 men from Selkirk killed in the Great War. As we remember them, and the hundreds of thousands and millions of others today, it's also worth noting that it is a mark of how much better the world is now that such sacrifice, such slaughter, is all but inconceivable.

There are thousands of terrible stories with which one can mark Remembrance Sunday. Stuart Bathgate wrote a fine piece for the...

Continue reading...

Filed under: First World War (5 more articles)

Email to a friend  |   Permalink   |   Comments (0)

Charles Krauthammer's Crazy, Lazy Complacency

Charles Krauthammer isn't as reliably and consistently wrong as Bill Kristol, but he's also determined to see the sun shining for Republicans. Thus:

The Obama coattails of 2008 are gone. The expansion of the electorate, the excitement of the young, came in uniquely propitious Democratic circumstances and amid unparalleled enthusiasm for electing the first African-American president.

November '08 was one-shot, one-time, never to be replicated. Nor was November '09 a realignment. It was a return to the norm -- and definitive confirmation that 2008 was one of the great flukes in American political history.

Continue reading...

Filed under: 2012 (4 more articles) , Conservatives (268 more articles) , Elections (86 more articles) , GOP (137 more articles) , Obama (206 more articles)

Email to a friend  |   Permalink   |   Comments (15)

Big Brother in Big Sky country

Not welcome in Montana. For shame.

A sad story of our times: residents of Belgrade, Montana petitioned the town council for permission to keep chickens in their yards. No-one objected to this. Except, of course, the councillors. Why? Because they could. Apparently the chickens might escape and that could be a problem for the police. Meanwhile, one ghastly councillor suggested there just wasn't enough room on a 10,000 square foot plot for half a dozen hens. 

The usual bullying, domineering nonsense from jumped-up little gauleiters of the sort who infest local...

Continue reading...

Filed under: Chicken (2 more articles) , Localism (6 more articles) , O Tempora, O Mores (145 more articles)

Email to a friend  |   Permalink   |   Comments (3)

The Euro-sceptics will bide their time before devouring another Tory leader? Great!

Yesterday I suggested that Europe may well end up destroying David Cameron's ministry and that, consequently, some of this week's maneouvering has been designed to delay that until a putative second term. So, it's interesting to see James reporting that:

The Euro-sceptics are quietly confident. The overwhelming mood among those I have spoken to is that Cameron either has to get the powers back he said he would and show that his measure to prevent any further transfers of sovereignty are effective or there will have to be at some point after 2014 an in or out

Continue reading...

Filed under: Cameron (50 more articles) , Europe (81 more articles) , Tories (80 more articles)

Email to a friend  |   Permalink   |   Comments (12)

Friday Afternoon Country: Lyle Lovett

Because, frankly, from Afghanistan to Texas to the corridors of Whitehall and the Bank of England, it's been a pretty bleak week it's appropriate to bring Saturday Morning Country forward by a few hours. This Lyle Lovett song - If I Had a Boat - always cheers me up.

Added bonus: with its dreams of boats and ponies and ifs and ans and all the rest of it you may also read it as an arch critique of the promises politicians feel compelled to make and that we, because we want to believe, choose to take at more than face...

Continue reading...

Filed under: Country music (19 more articles)

Email to a friend  |   Permalink   |   Comments (2)

Sod the Public: We Need Representatives, Not Delegates

I don't mean to pick on David Kerr, the SNP's candidate in the Glasgow North-East by-election, because, frankly, every single one of the candidates would say something like this:

"My commitment to the people of Glasgow North East is that I will always put them first. My priorities are their priorities."

Really? Personally, I'd prefer it if an MP (or even a prospective MP) put his or her judgement first. I want MPs who will "stand up" (and vote) for what they think right, not merely follow the party line or pander to the presumed self-interest of...

Continue reading...

Filed under: Democracy (4 more articles) , Westminster (67 more articles)

Email to a friend  |   Permalink   |   Comments (15)