Why has he not fallen victim to the ‘back-to-basics' trap? People say it’s because he has so successfully decontaminated the Tory brand. Because of his touchy-feely-greenery, the Tories can no longer credibly be painted as hatchet-faced bigots who would starve the feckless while kicking them into the gutter. Maybe so; but there are surely other explanations too.

‘Back-to-basics’ was a good idea hopelessly sold. Although it was originally supposed to be about education, as I recall, the Tories allowed it to be presented as ‘moralising’ about sexual behaviour. Given the serial sexual shenanigans of the then Tory administration along with its alleged animus against lone parents, the party set itself up for the media auto-da-fe which then ensued.

Cameron’s speech steered clear of]]> 2008-07-08T19:30:23+01:00 http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/822416/this-britain.thtml  

Toddlers who turn their noses up at spicy food from overseas could be branded racists by a Government-sponsored agency. The National Children's Bureau, which receives £12 million a year, mainly from Government funded organisations, has issued guidance to play leaders and nursery teachers advising them to be alert for racist incidents among youngsters in their care. This could include a child of as young as three who says ‘yuk’ in response to being served unfamiliar foreign food...Nurseries are encouraged to report as many incidents as possible to their local council.

Many British Muslims feel like the Jews of Europe...Shahid Malik, who was appointed as a minister in the Department for International Development (Dfid) by Gordon Brown last summer, said it has become legitimate to target Muslims in the media and society at large in a way that would be unacceptable for any other minority.

Mr Malik made clear that he was not equating the situation with the Holocaust but warned that many British Muslims now felt like ‘aliens in their own country’. He said he himself had been the target of a string of racist incidents, including the firebombing of his family car and an attempt to run him down at a petrol station.

‘I think most people would agree that if you ask Muslims today what do they feel like, they feel like the Jews of Europe,’ he said. ‘I don't mean to equate that with the Holocaust but in the way that it was legitimate almost – and still is in some parts – to target Jews, many Muslims would say

Barack Obama’s voting record in the Senate and the positions he struck when battling Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination placed him as arguably the most left-wing presidential candidate in living memory. Now he is running for the presidency itself, and aware that the white working class in particular view him with intense suspicion, he is shamelessly tacking to the centre, ruthlessly throwing overboard hitherto... ahem, deeply principled stands. So extensive are these flip-flops that Charles Krauthammer has written not one but two articles listing them.

Here's a cut-out-and-keep guide to the same old exciting new politics of triangulation that will take us in to the brave new dawn of a freshly principled era.

Old leftie Obama:

*No flag pin as ‘not truly patriotic’
*For ban on handguns
*No support for bill giving telecom companies blanket immunity for post-9/11 eavesdropping.
*Rubbished NAFTA
*Against private financing for presidential candidates
*Wants to meet Ahmadinejad without preconditions

New centrist Obama:

*Patriotic flag pin
*Against ban on hand guns
*Support for bill giving telecom companies blanket immunity for post-9/11 eavesdropping. 2008-07-06T21:58:09+01:00 http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/816511/what-part-of-theocracy-does-this-man-not-understand.thtml
After the Archbishop of Canterbury, now England’s most senior judge, the Lord Chief Justice Lord Phillips, has given a green light to the growth of sharia law in Britain in family matters and the arbitration of disputes. It’s not really a surprise that Lord Phillips thinks like this since he actually chaired the meeting where the Archbishop, Dr Rowan Williams, had his sharia moment. Dr Williams, said Lord Phillips, had been misquoted. Not so. It is Lord Phillips who does not appear to understand the significance of what Dr Williams was saying because, as Lord Phillips demonstrated in his own lecture last night at the London Muslim Centre, he is clearly just as ignorant and confused about Islam, sharia and the accepted relationship between religious minorities and the state.

Admitting that he knew little about sharia law, Lord Phillips said he had taken advice in Oman and that as a result of this (clearly highly partial and inadequate) briefing he was able to state:

I understand that it is not the case that for a Muslim to lead his or her life in accordance with these principles

‘We, the Arab and Islamic community, gather here today to express our resentment at the celebrations by the Jewish community and the evil/noxious Jew in Britain’.

[والوبيل اليهودي في بريطانيا]

Translation by DaveM

A preliminary evaluation held by Jerusalem police on Wednesday found that three police officers had attempted to stop the driver before he was eventually shot dead by Special Patrol Unit officer Eli Mizrahi, who was dispatched to the scene on a motorbike. But a video of the final moments of the attack shows a soldier in civilian clothing shooting Dwayat from close range with a handgun while standing outside the cabin. Only then is Mizrahi seen firing a number of rounds into the slumped body of the terrorist.

Despite the fact that the Israeli press refers to the attacker as a terrorist, it is at present not clear whether his motives were indeed political or whether he simply ran amok for personal reasons. There is no suggestion that he was part of a terrorist organisation. He]]> 2008-07-03T12:26:38+01:00 http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/795356/the-jihad-of-the-word.thtml

The signs have been ominous for some time but now it has become clear beyond a doubt that those who tell the truth about Islam, Islamism or Islamist terrorism risk having their career, livelihood and maybe even their liberty placed in jeopardy – and all in the name of human rights. In Canada, the columnist Mark Steyn has been arraigned before a kangaroo court for the crime of publishing in Macleans magazine an excerpt from his bestseller, America Alone, in which he argues that demographic change is turning Europe Islamic. Led by the Canadian Islamic Congress, Muslims have taken Steyn and Macleans to a ‘human rights’ tribunal on a charge of ‘hate speech’, a totalitarian statute enforced by the Canadian Human Rights Commission (sic) who are in the business of destroying the freedom to voice perfectly legitimate – indeed, absolutely vital and important – opinions about the need to defend western society against Islamist attack. Bad enough that Islamists browbeat and threaten people who express such opinions. For a body such as the CHRC to do their dirty work for them and act as the enforcers of the jihad against free]]> 2008-06-24T20:20:11+01:00 http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/796306/a-caledonian-caliphate.thtml
This blog post was originally duplicated on the site. The duplicate has now been deleted and the comments from it moved over to this thread.

Alex Salmond, leader of the Scottish National Party, has been spectacularly canny and effective as Scotland’s first minister, moving his nationalist pieces across the British constitutional chessboard with stealth and skill. But there’s a dimension to this that has so far passed below the radar – the scimitar slung around the kilt. Tomorrow, the Scottish Islamic Foundation will be launched in Edinburgh in Salmond’s presence. But as the invaluable Centre for Social Cohesion tells us, the leading members of this group and many of those who lead its events are closely linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, whose aim is the Islamisation of Britain and Europe.

Its chief executive Osama Saeed, who has worked as Salmond’s researcher and is the SNP’s parliamentary candidate for Glasgow Central, is an Islamist and leading light in the Brotherhood front the Muslim Association of Britain. Saeed follows the usual Brotherhood line of promoting certain limited moderate positions, such as calling for an end to]]> 2008-06-25T10:55:10+01:00 http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/811236/just-look-what-came-crawling-out.thtml
It seems that last Sunday’s demonstration in London celebrating Israel’s 60th anniversay has provoked a few scorpions to crawl out from under their stone. Harry’s Place reports this gem:

Here’s Mohammad Sawalha, President of the British Muslim Initiative, speaking to Al Jazeera in Arabic about his demonstration against last Sunday’s celebration of the foundation of the State of Israel:

The President of the British Muslim Initiative - Mohammad Sawalha - said in a speech to Al Jazeera:

“We, the Arab and Islamic community, gather here today to express our resentment at the celebrations by the Jewish community and the evil/noxious Jew in Britain”

[والوبيل اليهودي في بريطانيا] Translation by DaveM

Apart from the British Muslim Initiative, Sawalha has been active in a large number of other ventures. He is the past President of the Muslim Association of Britain. He was the founder of IslamExpo, and is registered as the holder of the IslamExpo domain name. He is also a trustee of the Finsbury Park Mosque: which was taken over from Abu Hamza by the Muslim Association of Britain, with the help of Detective Inspector