World

Sancho Panza’s long-cherished ambition was to become a politician. He wanted to be installed as governor of an island; Don Quixote had led him to believe that this was the reward a loyal squire could expect to receive from the knight errant he had served. Attractive opportunities to move into government increased dramatically for Spain’s latter-day Sanchos after the death of Franco; almost overnight one of Europe’s most centralised nations became a quasi-federal state with 17 autonomous communities. Each of these 17 regions has its own parliament and government and well-paid politicians. The head of the autonomous community of Catalonia, for example, has a salary of €153,000 (£138,500) a year

Britain is often said to be two weeks behind France in the new Covid wave — so how bad are things in France? Lille, Grenoble, Lyon and Saint-Étienne have switched to maximum alert, with two thirds of regions on ‘enhanced alert’. Things are at their most worrying in Paris, where hospitals have been given permission to cancel routine surgery. Neither the capital, nor the rest of the country, is overwhelmed — yet. Covid cases are rising almost as fast as in Britain: some 20,000 new cases were declared yesterday, almost three times the number of confirmed cases in the first wave. The positivity rate (i.e., the rate of people testing

Berlin’s partygoers are being told to stay at home by health experts and politicians amid rising new coronavirus cases. Researchers say that clubs and restaurants have become super spreading hubs as Germany’s looser Covid-19 restrictions have allowed events to take place again.  Germany’s infection control agency warned on Tuesday that the country could see up to 10,000 new coronavirus cases a day after it recorded the highest daily infection rate since April. There were more than 4,000 new cases confirmed on Thursday and then another 4,000 confirmed today. The announcement has raised fears that the pandemic is picking up pace in a country that so far has coped better than many of its European neighbours. Health Minister Jens Spahn has

What is Donald Trump’s greatest gift? Some say his finely honed instincts; others, his tabloid genius for publicity. But we all know, really, that it is his ludicrous ability to drive the media into ever greater spasms of apoplexy. Just when you think he can’t make journalists go madder, he outdoes himself. It’s like watching Fred Astaire dance, Roger Federer hit a topspin backhand, or Patrick Mahomes glide outside the pocket — you know you are watching a talent that is unique and God-given. It’s art. Take last night, and Trump’s evacuation from Walter Reed hospital. It was all deeply absurd. After days of confusing messages as to the President’s

You do have to wonder what liberal America must think of Britain. We are, according to its paper of record, swamp-dwelling, boiled mutton munching, insular little Englanders. Indeed, the New York Times’s latest profile of Covid Britain only serves to compound this mythical vision of a floundering, backwards country.  The report in question presents a country unable to conform to even basic Covid measures — Brits refusing to mask up in crowded grocers and crammed onto public transport. Via an awkward segue, with an apparent lack of irony, the author invokes the London of the Blitz (we’re the ones obsessed with world war two, huh?) before asking: ‘How did that society turn into this one?’ The

‘How is the president feeling?’ shouldn’t be a difficult question to answer. And yet over the last 24 hours, nobody could say with any clarity that Donald Trump was ill, on the mend, or perfectly fine. Even reporters with impeccable sources in the White House bubble were left flabbergasted as completely contradictory accounts emerged from multiple sources. Minutes after the president’s doctors emerged from the Walter Reed medical complex to brief reporters about a president coming back from the coronavirus strong and in good spirits, the White House chief of staff told the press that Trump’s condition was quite serious. Trump, who can’t stand when subordinates are fouling up the