World

The sting music has blared, the media hype is in, and the midterms are set to be the most important American elections in nearly two years. Now, as normal people head to the polls, it’s time for us political junkies to jumper-cable our brains straight into the vote tallies. You, too, can pretend to know what will happen before the results are even in. Here are seven things to watch tonight as the makeup of Congress is decided. The Pennsylvania Senate race The most ballyhooed Senate contest really is worth all the attention it’s getting. For some of us, choosing between stroke victim John Fetterman and Oprah houseplant Mehmet Oz

‘There are two things that are important in politics,’ said the 19th century senator Mark Hanna. ‘The first is money and I can’t remember what the second one is.’ The maxim remains true in 2022. Public polling is all well and good, and useful in its way. Yet in a country as sprawling and complex and bitterly divided as the United States of America, and with so much information available online at everyone’s fingertips, polls can easily be used to suggest whatever you want.  Political parties inevitably lie about their electoral prospects and hide their rather more sophisticated (and less biased) internal polling. But campaigns can’t altogether conceal their spending

Are there any redeeming features of the Qatar World Cup? Perhaps one: the tournament has a sane and logical format. Having 32 teams reduced to 16 after the group stage, followed by a straight knock out is easy to understand and should produce an exciting third round of games and plenty of thrills thereafter. But if you do have the stomach for Qatar 2022 savour this comforting crumb: it could be the last time a major tournament is organised in a way that makes sense from a footballing – rather than a revenue generating – standpoint. For let’s look ahead to USA 2026. There might not be human rights concerns

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, British press and public opinion has been firmly behind Volodymyr Zelensky. But is it healthy to look at any subject so uncritically? If a year or more of fighting will achieve nothing, then why prolong the bloodshed? The How To Academy has just held a debate about this delicate subject in London. The motion was ‘Now is the Time To Make Peace in Ukraine’. I went along, with some of the Spectator team. Our colleague Svitlana Morenets, who writes our weekly Ukraine email (sign up here), was speaking against the motion. It was a fascinating debate. Peter Hitchens, opening for the motion, said

This afternoon, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz goes to China. His one-day visit to Beijing is the first by a democratic leader since the outbreak of the Covid pandemic nearly three years ago. But before he has even touched down on Chinese soil, Scholz’s trip is going down badly back home.  ‘It’s the wrong visit at the wrong time,’ declared the broadsheet newspaper Die Welt. Scholz will be the first Western leader to meet with President Xi since he secured his unprecedented third term in power. For many China-watchers, Xi’s consolidated rule and zombification of the country’s Communist party marks a watershed moment for the country – not one, according to