More women MPs, please
From Amber Rudd
Sir: Rod Liddle’s article on women candidates in the Conservative party contains an irritating and often repeated inaccuracy. (‘Let’s not forget the weirdos and halfwits’, 17/24 December). He refers to ‘the refusal of women to put themselves forward as potential candidates’. No such refusal has taken place. Women are putting themselves forward. As one of the women on this list, I know many of the others and know them to be just as talented and capable as their male colleagues. In fact the candidates’ list, from which the target seats will be selecting next year, is currently 25 per cent women.
Please do not credit us with ‘plain good sense’ and therefore no interest in active politics. Don’t patronisingly pop us back in the home with that belittling phrase. We can be just as ambitious, pushy and single-minded as our male colleagues. It is hoped that this time around the constituencies select women at least in proportion to their representation on the list, so that the Conservative party can significantly increase the number of women MPs without any reduction in the quality.
Amber Rudd
London W8
Is ‘belief’ beneficial?
From Dr John Stoneman
Sir: I have considerable regard for Mark Steyn’s views on the world. However, I fear he has been rather confused in his article on rationality in your issue of 17/24 December (‘O come, all ye faithless’). There is a genuine debate as to whether ‘religion’ (take your pick) is true, and second, a quite distinct debate as to whether a belief in religion (true or not) is good for human societies. It’s worth stressing the distinction between truth (whatever it is) and the effects of belief in truth or untruth.
John Stoneman
Exbourne, Devon
Belt up
From Michael Simons
Sir: Simon Nixon trivialises Green Belt legislation to a reckless degree (‘No bubble, no slump’, 31 December). Far from benefiting a mere handful of stockbrokers, it is thanks to the Green Belt that several millions of Londoners still live within 15 miles or less of open countryside, rather than in a vast megalopolis stretching from Chelmsford to Southampton and from Reading to Maidstone. England is by far the most densely populated major country in Europe, and the breathing space given by open country between our conurbations remains vital to our quality of life. New homes must be provided without the urban shadow spreading across the whole land, and that means strong Green Belt legislation proof against arbitrary overrule by government-appointed ‘inspectors’.
Michael Simons
Ruislip, Middlesex
America fair
From G.E. French
Sir: What a lovely piece of American nostalgia by Geoffrey Wheatcroft (‘God Bless America, not Bush’, 17/24 December). I too had, and still have, that marvellous continent and its people close to my heart. Warts and all. We knew about the nasty bits, of course: slavery, the near genocide of the Indians, crime, corruption. But what else in the 20th century was there to compare with the wonderful popular music, the movies, the architecture, the literature, the steady improvement in the lives of the ‘ordinary’ people and that heart-stopping statue in the harbour? Where else was that honest, unembarrassed patriotism and positive, easy self-confidence? Not to mention the intellectual delight of Jewish humour. But the times they are a-changing and it is not only Scarlett and Rhett who have gone with the wind. Even the US cavalry seems to charge in the wrong direction these days. And Walt Whitman’s shining western star is not so bright any more, to our great concern and regret.
G.E. French
Maidstone, Kent
Slow bus to Swindon
From Philip French
Sir: In his review of Stephen Fry’s The Ode Less Travelled (Books, 31 December) Grey Gowrie recalls an apparently accidental piece of verse he found in a lavatory by Wells Cathedral. The graffito he saw — ‘I’d like to [single syllable] you on a slow bus to Swindon’ — is in fact an obscene local paraphrase of the opening lines of a 1948 hit song by Frank Loesser, a writer-composer who loved monosyllables and is most celebrated for Guys and Dolls. It goes, ‘I’d love to get you on a slow boat to China’ and was performed by, among others, Doris Day, Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. Sadly this jaunty song fell into desuetude with the communist victory in China the following year. Perhaps the time has come to revive it.
Philip French
London NW5
Lewis vs Pullman
From David Watkins
Sir: Further to Caroline Moore’s spirited defence of C.S. Lewis (‘War of the worlds’, 17/24 December): however wrong-headed Lewis may have been as a moralist, he was a most open-minded and generous critic. Very often he enthusiastically praised writers of fantasy — Wagner, Morris, Wells, Stapledon, Eddison — whose views, as reflected in their work, he thought misguided and deplorable. If he were writing now, I’ve no doubt he would admire Philip Pullman’s fantasies. A shame that Pullman can’t be a little generous to Lewis.
David Watkins
Cardiff
Eye and I
From Christopher Booker
Sir: As a keen student of the ever-growing mythology surrounding the origins of Private Eye, I must congratulate Patrick Marnham for his novel suggestion that Paul Foot was invited to be the magazine’s first editor (Books, 17/24 December). I am not sure there would have been room for him when Willy Rushton and I were putting together those first issues on the floor of Rushton’s diminutive bedroom, but I’m sure the jokes would have been terrific.
Christopher Booker
Litton, Somerset
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