World

A lovely, gentle, mildly nostalgic piece in the New York Times by Gay Talese, recounting his maiden trip aboard one of the tourist cruisers that sail around Manhattan. It’s as elegant and neat and finely-constructed as you might imagine: Atop a cliff on the Manhattan bank of the Harlem River stands the 185-foot Highbridge Water Tower, which resembles a medieval minaret and housed a carillon that chimed tunes thrice daily until it was destroyed by arson in 1984. Across the river, within view of Yankee Stadium (or stadiums, both old and new), two young boys hurled stones toward our vessel, failing to reach the mark but prompting Captain Weber to

I thought my old friend Yvonne Ridley was just taking the money from the clerical fascists as a presenter at Iranian state channel Press TV. I didn’t realise she had been spouting the Iranian regime’s line on the election.  But here’s her reply to my post to her Facebook page asking her when she was going to resign: “What I find particularly upsetting is the inference that the working class and poor living in rural areas don’t really count — that their votes are inferior to the elite classes in north Tehran… maybe it’s ‘cos I’m a working class lass from Tyneside.” I must say it’s the first time I’ve

I defy you to find a better story today. Sad, obviously for the tiny wrestlers and their fans, but pure, unadulterated, newspaper gold for everyone else. We need more details but, by the looks of it anyway, this has the potential to be the story of the year… Two professional midget wrestlers have been found dead in a low-rent hotel room in Mexico City. La Parkita (Little Death) and Espectrito Jr – in real life brothers Alberto and Alejandro Jiménez – had been entertaining two prostitutes on the night of their death. Police beileve the women gave the pair, both 35, a fatal drugs overdose before fleeing with their belongings.

I was delighted to have the opportunity to talk about the Iranian state channel Press TV on Newsnight last night (see footage below). Nick Ferrari has resigned as a presenter over the channel’s coverage of recent events in Iran and I’m certain Andrew Gilligan will do the same. This dreadful channel should be allowed to wither through neglect by serious journalists. Meanwhile I hear the Iranian journalist Maziar Bahari has been detained, of which more in later posts. The next stage of this terrible crisis seems to be the detention of dissidents and intellectuals. Fellow journalists should do everything they can to publicise these cases.

Gary Lineker once observed that football was a simple game in which 22 men ran around the pitch, and then the Germans won. Much the same could be said of the car industry. It’s a simple enough business, in which everyone spends billions on big factories and flashy dealerships. And then the Germans make all the money. Until now, that is. In the last year, through a spectacular mixture of family pride, in-fighting and historical resentment, two of the mightiest names in German industrial history, the car-makers Porsche and Volkswagen, have steered themselves to the edge of cata-strophe. It’s a story of hubris on an epic scale. It’s also a

What next for Sarah Palin? Todd Purdum’s Vanity Fair profile is designed to be, as Jason Zengerle puts it, brutal. But, as the Economist’s Democracy in America notes, there are times when it also, perhaps unwittingly, makes one feel a little sorry for Governor Palin. Whatever her shortcomings, she wasn’t the one who put her into a national race she was ill-prepared to handle and, whatever else may be said about her behaviour on the campaign trail, unattributable sniping from John McCain’s advisers should be taken with some salt, not least because it so conveniently absolves McCain of the mistakes that helped doom his campaign. Palin is a useful target

Long-time readers may recall that one of this blog’s minor amusements is chronicling the ridiculous extent to which some Americans – mainly, it must be said, on the right – go in their efforts to decry the baleful influence of soccer upon the American ideals of manly sporting excellence. There was, for instance, this example in March, complaining about the insidious impact soccer was having on the culture of suburban America. Now, in the aftermath of the United States’ surprising victory* against Spain this week, Gary Schmitt, once of the Project for a New American Century and now residing at the American Enterprise Institute, complains that: As someone who didn’t

In one sense, of course, John McCain is correct to say: “The president saying that we didn’t want to be perceived as meddling, is, frankly, not what America’s history is all about.” And while one may say that, more often than not, the United States has been one of, for want of a less crude way of putting it, the Good Guys even that country’s admirers must acknowledge that this has not always or universally been the case. And that has led to problems. It also, frankly, makes one pretty happy that John McCain ain’t President. Relatedly, it would be useful if Obama’s advisors ceased this sort of nonsense: But

Really interesting debate on who is winning the Blog/Comment War last night at Edelman HQ in Victoria Street. I tried to argue that they are part of the same continuum. I have never seen them as particularly antagonistic.  I suggested that we are yet to see a “classic” or “great” blog posting in the way that you have memorable comment pieces that stay with you for life. Peter Beaumont’s Observer piece about Iran at the weekend is one such article. There has been some good discussion of the debate at journalism.co.uk and Mark Reckons. Mark (a Lib Dem blogger) has challenged my assertion that there are no classic blog posts and

There are a few things that could be said about this snippet from Mr d’Ancona’s Sunday Telegraph column: More to the point, they [the Broonocracy] believe – as an article of faith, of irreducible conviction – that the Cameroons are bad people whose wickedness expresses itself in the slashing of the state. One of the words Brown uses most often in private to describe the Tory leader is “libertarian”: a word that conveys his belief that Cameron’s “compassionate conservatism” is mere window-dressing, but also hints at a decadent strain of Tory libertinage, drug-taking and yacht-fondling. 1. Gordon Brown clearly has a very limited understanding of libertariansm. 2. If only Dave

The Michigan Republican is owed our thanks for producing what must be the most absurd reaction to the Iranian drama yet and, let it be said, a welcome moment of light relief. The other day he made the mistake of Twittering that “Iranian twitter activity similar to what we did in House last year when Republicans were shut down in the House.” For real. This being the internets, it’s no surprise that a blog was born gently chiding Mr Hoekstra. (As pictured) People can be so cruel. But that’s the intertubes for you. Doubtless readers will want to make their own suggestions, blending the mundane with the historic to produce