Society

Thursday

Justin Webb

Trump misses Biden

Chicago Everyone in the Democrats’ Convention centre – a bleakly corporate sports stadium on the edge of Chicago – is giggling. It’s an atmosphere properly described as bonkers. The Democrats have gone from wake to wedding party with no intervening period of sobriety. People whoop as they meet, knowing how miserable they were prepared to feel with Joe Biden still on the ticket, and how freed from misery they are now. I thought Chicago an oddly dangerous choice for the Democrats (1968 and all that) but I was wrong: I had forgotten what a great city it is. The centre is grand, the hotels capacious and snooty, one of them

Charles Moore Charles Moore

Who will stand up for France’s aristocrats?

When it was recently announced that 40,000 people, the great majority civilians, have been killed in the Gaza conflict, I checked the media coverage. Almost all – Sky, CNN, the Guardian etc – correctly reported that the figure came from the Hamas health ministry. All, however, implied acceptance of the figure’s accuracy by the prominence they gave it (except for the Guardian, preposterously plus royaliste que le roi, which said the Hamas figure ‘does not tell the full story of Palestinian losses’). The classic example was the BBC. The story led the six o’clock news on Radio 4, the serious programme with the bongs of Big Ben, always considered the gold

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Sourdough is the yeast of our problems

Are radical lesbians dictating what we can and cannot eat, through the offices of this very magazine? It would certainly seem to be the case. A year ago this month, Julie Bindel wrote on The Spectator’s website disparaging sourdough bread with even more venom than she reserves for her more usual targets, i.e. those men-lady people and er, men. What has happened since that vigorous diatribe is the gradual disappearance of sourdough from the shelves of our supermarkets, as if by official edict. Marks & Spencer used to be full of the stuff, but my two local stores no longer stock packaged sourdough and the same is true to only

Luke McShane

The depraved world of chess cheats

Amina Abakarova, a 40-year-old chess player from Russia, supposedly tried to poison a younger rival at the Dagestan Chess Championship this month. Camera footage seems to show her furtively applying a substance to one side of a chess board before the start of the game. Her opponent later became unwell and a Russian news agency claimed that the substance contained mercury. I first saw the story on one of the many specialist chess news sites. Within 48 hours it was in most national newspapers. Two types of chess stories pop up time and again. First, the ones about child prodigies, which tend towards the formulaic – I know because they

The Spectator

Labour’s union problem

Less than two months in, one aspect of Keir Starmer’s government is becoming clear. This administration is closer to the trade unions than any we have had in the past 45 years. It is not just that the government has ceded readily to wage demands from teachers (a 5.5 per cent rise this year), junior doctors (22 per cent over two years) and train drivers (15 per cent over three years) – it has done so without seeking any agreement to changes in working practices. Given the abysmal productivity record of the public sector in recent years, especially since the pandemic, this is a remarkable omission. The government’s failure to

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: prisoners are freed, Ted Baker closes and train drivers announce strikes 

Home Emergency measures, known as Operation Early Dawn, were brought in to ease prison overcrowding. Defendants would be summoned to a magistrates’ court only when a space in prison was ready for them, the government said, and would be kept in police holding cells or released on bail while they awaited trial. The measures at first affected the north and the Midlands. By the beginning of the week, 472 people had been charged with offences arising from the recent public disorder; 300 had appeared in court in the preceding week. Donna Conniff, aged 40, the mother of six children, was jailed for two years for throwing a brick at police

Tuesday

Gareth Roberts Gareth Roberts

Why the ‘sensibles’ aren’t happy now the Tories are gone 

I have to confess that, like many other commentators, I thought that the coming of the Labour government would mean – at least for a bit – that things might get a little quieter, at least on social media. I was quite looking forward to that. But it all seems to have got even madder.  This century has brought many wonders, but the sight of Carol Vorderman criticising somebody else for being overpaid for their TV work – that’s surely the most stupefying of them all When Twitter first materialised in the late noughties under a Labour government, it was – honestly, straight up – a quite sociable place. People pottered about on

Ali Kefford

How did the superyacht Bayesian sink?

On Monday morning at 5 a.m. the superyacht Bayesian sank off the coast of Sicily, leaving one man dead and six people missing. Among the unaccounted for are the British tech tycoon Mike Lynch, who had been enjoying a celebratory cruise after a US jury acquitted him of fraud charges in June, and his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah. Fifteen people, including a baby, were rescued from the ship, after being found crammed into a nearby lifeboat. The incident would have played out in a handful of horrific minutes. How did the 56 meter Bayesian come to sink? Each of the current theories suggest the incident would have played out in a handful of horrific minutes. Experts believe that

Terry Barnes

The selfishness of defecting to another country

Elite sport is a selfish business. It’s all about achieving success for yourself. However much others have contributed to your success – your teammates, your coaches, your sports administrators, and the taxpayers and sponsors who pour money into you and your sport – they merely share your reflected glory. Even nationality itself is negotiable: if you can achieve your personal ambitions under a different flag, so be it. In the end, it’s all about you. Richardson’s choice highlights how little nationality seems to matter these days for elite and professional sports people Given that ‘me first’ mentality of elite sportsmen and women, it’s no surprise that cyclist sprinter Matthew Richardson, fresh

Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

This is only the start of the small boats crisis

Illegal immigrants continue to flow into England across the calm waters of the Channel. The latest data from the Home Office states that nearly 1,500 people have arrived in the last week. Weekends are proving particularly popular: 703 migrants came ashore on Sunday August 11 and 492 made landfall last Saturday. So much for Keir Starmer’s pre-election pledge to be tough on small boats and tough on the causes of small boats. Labour’s apparent indifference to mass uncontrolled immigration is no doubt a significant factor in the recent poll that revealed more than half of Britons believe the government ‘is heading in the wrong direction’. A majority of Britons would say the same thing of

Philip Patrick Philip Patrick

Japan just can’t find the staff

‘Kanko kankai’ (tourism pollution) is the latest buzz phrase here in Japan as the double-edged samurai sword of the visitor boom continues to cause profit but also pain. The latest problem, along with the overcrowding, poor behaviour, and squeezed out locals, is a shortage of staff at the main attractions and the hotels and restaurants that surround them. Which, given the importance of quality service in Japanese culture, is a veritable crisis. Healthcare, distribution and agriculture are all facing, to varying degrees, serious issues due to a lack of manpower There is nothing especially new in this. Labour shortages have long been a problem as the society ages, the fertility

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

Joe Biden’s underwhelming convention farewell speech

Chicago Joe Biden has given a speech at every single Democratic National Convention since 1976. Tonight was his last and he didn’t start speaking until 10.28 p.m., local time. Far past his bed time.  Why so late? Poor planning? Or a cynical attempt to push the President’s appearance past ‘prime time’ – in case he had another major meltdown?  Convention officials were quick to say that Biden’s big finale had been delayed by the ‘raucous applause’ and ‘electric atmosphere’ in the convention centre, which had interrupted speakers in the build-up. Hmmm. Perhaps we’ll never know. Whatever the case, it seemed to add insult to injury for a Commander-in-Chief who, as

Andrew Fox

How Israel is clearing Hamas out of Rafah

Rafah, Gaza The heat, the sand, the soldiers. I’m in Rafah, a war zone unlike any other. As a former soldier, it’s an unsettling experience. Every time we get out of a vehicle, I reach for a weapon I do not have. Instead of my army fatigues, I’m wearing lightweight trousers, a polo shirt and a blue helmet signifying I’m a civilian guest of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). There’s one thing that hits me more than anything else while I’m here: the damage to Gaza. It is appalling. Almost every building is damaged, and many are destroyed outright. After 7 October, Hamas had to be removed from Gaza. But they

Monday

Owen Matthews

Why is Lukashenko pushing for an end to the Ukraine war?

Could Belarus’s Aleksandr Lukashenko be the key to ending the Ukraine conflict? In a surprising intervention over the weekend, the long-time dictator and close Putin ally said in an interview on Russian state TV that ‘Nazis don’t exist on the territory of Ukraine’ – a key part of Putin’s stated war aims. He also called for negotiations to begin in order to end the conflict. Lukashenko claimed that ‘neither the Ukrainian people, nor the Russians, nor the Belarusians need [this conflict]’, adding that only the West wanted this war to continue. His shift to a strong pro-peace line goes strongly against the current Kremlin signalling Lukashenka has hitherto been a

David Shipley

The toxicity of two-tier justice

One of the worst things about prison is the rules. Before I was sentenced I’d imagined jail as a rigid, structured, disciplined environment where infractions would be punished without fear or favour. The reality is much, much worse. In our prisons rules are often enforced capriciously or not at all. There’s a two-tier system. A favoured prisoner may be allowed to flout regulations while one who’s seen as difficult or challenging will face consequences and sanctions. Some rules are simply ignored. In my time at Wandsworth the smell of spice or cannabis would often waft from cells on to the landings where prison officers stood. They did nothing. Easier to leave a prisoner in

Alexander Larman

Is Prince Andrew finally getting the boot from Windsor?

After a relatively quiet few months for Prince Andrew, there have been two recent developments that will no doubt make this famously un-sweaty man feel a nervous chill. Firstly, following the mixed response that Scoop, the first account of his notorious interview with Emily Maitlis, received, the first pictures have been released of the Amazon TV version of the story, A Very Royal Scandal. The notoriously vain Duke of York will no doubt be disappointed to see that the ever-chameleonic Michael Sheen seems to be playing him with considerable padding round the waist, in what promises to be a uniquely unflattering look at the Newsnight saga. And secondly, after much

Graham Watts

In defence of breakdancer Raygun

How annoying must it be to win an Olympic title but be totally eclipsed by a competitor who failed to win a single contest? Such has been the fate of Ami Yuasa of Japan who defeated Dominika Banevič, the reigning World and European Champion, to win the Breaking gold medal at the recent Olympic Games. Her Olympic glory was totally overshadowed by 36-year-old Australian, Rachael Gunn (known competitively as Raygun) whose performance went viral despite losing each of her three preliminary battles, including a contest against Banevič (known as Nicka). Raygun may have been comprehensively defeated on the cypher (the circle in which the battle takes place) but her performance

Sunday

Mike Pitts

How was the Stonehenge Altar Stone moved from Scotland?

I’ve had a keen interest in Stonehenge since I directed my first excavation there more than 40 years ago. A personal highlight was identifying a skeleton in London’s Natural History Museum, which archaeologists thought had been destroyed in the Blitz, and which turned out to be the remains of an Anglo-Saxon man beheaded beside the stone circle. Claims are made weekly, it seems, for some new insight into Stonehenge’s meaning, history or construction – and not all of them are mad. But I cannot remember an occasion when a single discovery changed the way I think about Stonehenge as much as the one announced this week.  I cannot remember an occasion

Kevin Toolis

How neurodiversity took over the Edinburgh Fringe

At this year’s Edinburgh Fringe, the new thing, the hot ticket, is being neurodiverse. Across comedy, stand up, magic and the spoken word it’s not so much Lady Macbeth as My Mental Health. Standing out in the chaos of the 3,000 plus shows of Edinburgh Fringe by being ‘different’ has always been the number one prerequisite for gathering any kind of audience. And this year it seems like show after show is doing that by focusing on the psychological compulsions of the performers themselves. ‘Lady ADHD’, ‘Hyperactivity Disorder’, ‘Naughty or Neurodiverse: Magic from another planet’, ‘Baby Belle: Young, Dumb and full of Autism’, ‘River Time’, and ‘Unstuck’ are just some of the

Nigel Jones

Did the Prime Minister have an affair with a woman half his age?

As a connoisseur of British political scandals I have long puzzled over one of the most intriguing of all such affairs: did Edwardian Liberal Prime Minister H.H. Asquith have sex with Venetia Stanley, a woman young enough to be his daughter? She certainly took up huge amounts of his time and attention in August 1914 when he should have been exclusively focused on the conflict that became the first world war.  There is no doubt that the veteran PM was a ladies’ man who was notoriously ‘unsafe in taxis The same question has now engaged the talents of the bestselling thriller writer Robert Harris, whose latest novel Precipice – out later this month