Society

Monday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Lionel Messi’s Greatest Talent: Joy

Goals don’t come much better than this. Part of Lionel Messi’s charm – and his football really is charming – comes from the impish glee that runs through his performances. There’s an almost childlike joy to Messi’s game that leaves you smiling and feeling just a little better about the world. Some of that, no doubt, comes from the fact that he still looks as though he’s a 12 year old playing amongst men, but there’s a purity about Messi too that raises his football far above his erstwhile rivals for the title of Greatest Footballer of His Time. Aesthetics are not the only fruit, but they matter. Is there

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Lexicographers for Palin

Her reach – and ability to generate traffic – knows few bounds: The Oxford English Dictionary has just named “refudiate” word of the year. The Oxford link seems to be crashing at the moment, from volume, no doubt. Last year, apparently, it was “unfriend” and the year before “hypermiling” (whatever that is). And actually, “refudiate” isn’t a bad neologism/malapropsim at all. It has a certain something to it, even if it also suggests that the refutation in question may well be based upon hyperbogus assumptions. UPDATE: But what about malamanteau?!  

The Spectator

CoffeeHousers’ Wall, 15 November – 21 November

Welcome to the latest CoffeeHousers’ Wall. For those who haven’t come across the Wall before, it’s a post we put up each Monday, on which – providing your writing isn’t libellous, crammed with swearing, or offensive to common decency – you’ll be able to say whatever you like in the comments section. There is no topic, so there’s no need to stay ‘on topic’ – which means you’ll be able to debate with each other more freely and extensively. There’s also no constraint on the length of what you write – so, in effect, you can become Coffee House bloggers. Anything’s fair game – from political stories in your local

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Tales from an Older Ireland

Lord knows, in matters such as these the Catholic church can enforce it’s own disciplinary regime. But, really, didn’t this particular horse bolt some time ago? An Irish Catholic priest has been banned by the Vatican from publishing any more of his writings after he suggested homosexuality is “simply a facet of the human condition”. This follows an article on homosexuality by Capuchin priest Fr Owen O’Sullivan, published in last March’s edition of the Furrow magazine. Described as “a journal for the contemporary Church”, the Furrow is published at St Patrick’s College Maynooth. […]The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican contacted the Capuchin secretary general in Rome with

Sunday

Scott Jordan-Harris

COMEDY: The Little Waster

When I was 14, and wearing one of my father’s old shirts back to front in one of those secondary school Art lessons that facilitate conversation more than they facilitate artistic endeavour, I was in the middle of a monologue, when a friend interrupted me. ‘Scott,’ he said. ‘You sound just like Hugh Grant.’ I was pleased, until he added, ‘Too bad you don’t look like him – or you’d be pulling girls like crazy.’   My accent – a sort of sub-standard Hugh Grant-Henry Higgins mash-up, certain to enchant Americans but equally certain to mark me out as irrevocably middle class to anyone with even the most distant upper class

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

IDS shows how arguments are won

For years, I have complained that the Conservatives have timidly stayed within Labour’s intellectual parameters, arguing that they need “permission” to make certain arguments and need to stay within the limits of what the public find acceptable. Such intellectual timidity confined them to opposition: they can never win, playing by Labour rules. Iain Duncan Smith is breaking free of this. It may be rash to predict it now, but I believe he is on the brink of a breakthrough in the way that welfare is regarded in Britain. This victory in a battle of ideas could be the greatest single blow against poverty in a generation. The extent of this

Saturday

The Spectator

Letters | 13 November 2010

Vulgar debate Sir: I have to disagree with Theodore Dalrymple on his always jaundiced view of England and the English (‘Common people’, 6 November). I work in a tourist area of Sydney and find the English/British the least offensive of any of the overseas visitors. They are also the most attractive, especially the young backpackers all tanned up from days on Bondi beach. And always very polite. I travel to England twice a year and use the trains and tubes, and the ferry over to France, and am always impressed by the orderliness I encounter. Sure, I see some fat, tattooed, pierced, appallingly toothed people, but surely they are the

Alan Judd

Motoring: Wheels of fortune

New tyres this week for my 1999 Discovery. The last lot, General Grabbers, lasted 30,000 miles. Their Michelin predecessors (bought and fitted at Costco, 20 per cent off) did 37,000 miles. I doubt the new £88 Cooper Discoverers will achieve that but I’ll be disappointed if they don’t reach 30,000. New tyres this week for my 1999 Discovery. The last lot, General Grabbers, lasted 30,000 miles. Their Michelin predecessors (bought and fitted at Costco, 20 per cent off) did 37,000 miles. I doubt the new £88 Cooper Discoverers will achieve that but I’ll be disappointed if they don’t reach 30,000. I was speaking thus while admiring a neighbour’s newish Audi

Robin Oakley

The turf: No loss, no gain

Those of us who occasionally advocate the hazarding of money on horses have to live with a little scepticism, too. In fact, those of us who live with Mrs Oakley (actually, it’s only me) have to live with a lot of it. If I were to give up punting, she believes, we could live on Meursault rather than Merlot. There she is wrong. At the price you pay for Meursault these days we only drink it when I have some mad money from a decent win. But this summer Mrs Oakley was neither right nor wrong about my tipping. Our Twelve to Follow ran in 42 races between them, securing

Melissa Kite

Real life | 13 November 2010

For those of us who don’t do it, parenting is a bit of a mystery. A strange, magical, glamorous mystery that we imagine is bedevilled by all sorts of complex and exciting challenges. What a mind-blowing experience it must be to manufacture another human being and steer him into the world, we think. Which is why it was such a disappointment looking after a friend’s teenager for a week. I now realise that parenting involves only two things: persuading a child to eat and persuading a child to put on a coat. That’s it. There is nothing else involved. Which is not to say that it is a simple matter.

Jeremy Clarke

Low life | 13 November 2010

I keep reading these heart-warming pieces in the quality press about sad and lonely people’s lives being utterly transformed by internet-dating websites. This person says her sex life has gone from zero to something resembling the stampede at a Harrods sale. That person says he thought his life was effectively over and has now found the person of his dreams, and their union is shortly to be blessed with issue. Anecdotal evidence, too, suggests that internet-dating sites have something for everyone. One of the chaps I go to football with, Pie and Mash Pete, is always talking about this friend of his with whom he goes fishing. Roger is nearly

Taki

High life | 13 November 2010

This is a good time to be in the Bagel. Walking briskly under changing autumn skies amid colours that still carry their summer clothes is an inspiring experience. Heaven knows I need it. Early morning means judo training — hangover or not — and on foggy days I walk through the park as if in a trance longing to reach the dojo before I’m enveloped by the yellow mist. After training, it’s as if a heavy load had been lifted from my shoulders. Literally. The heavy-duty training I’m putting in now will pay dividends next year. That’s how it goes, judo-wise, karate-wise, tennis-wise, sport-wise. It’s like nature: one has to

Toby Young Toby Young

Status Anxiety: Don’t mention the movies

Flicking through George W. Bush’s memoirs, one thing that jumped out was the way in which the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom chose to occupy their time together when they first met on W’s ranch in Texas. They spent the evening watching Meet the Parents. Now you might think that’s fairly unusual. Couldn’t they have done something more useful with those few precious hours, such as discussing climate change? Some readers will conclude that this was typical of Bush and Blair, two fundamentally frivolous men. In fact, this is absolutely normal. That’s what heads of state do when they get together —

Mary Killen

Dear Mary | 13 November 2010

Q. I was waiting for the London train at my local railway station the other morning when I saw a neighbour whose business is doing spectacularly well at the moment. He came up grinning and announced that he had just been shooting in Suffolk on the estate my husband’s family used to own. He said, ‘I had no idea how grand you used to be. I must say, it’s more fun going up the ladder than going down.’ I was dumbfounded and could not think of a response before the train came and he headed for first class and I for second. Mary, what could I have said? — P.W.,

The Spectator

Remember the living

Various political attempts to institute a national British day have failed, perhaps because Britain already has one. It is Armistice Day, and it is marked not by the waving of flags, or by the recitation of a national creed, but by keeping a silence in memory of those who sacrificed their lives for our country. Armistice Day, however, has always been about the living as well as the fallen. The poppies we wear are not just a commemoration of Flanders, but a sign that we support our soldiers in the battlefield today. Since the Taleban were toppled from Kabul nine years ago, 180,000 servicemen and women have fought campaigns in

Dot Wordsworth

Mind your language | 13 November 2010

Benjamin Blayney is no celebrity, but he was responsible for what the Americans call the King James Bible, and we the Authorised Version. His work appeared in 1769, and almost the whole edition was consumed by a fire at the warehouse in Paternoster Row, London. Yet his is the Bible we know today. I know that we are about to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the Authorised Version, but Dr Blayney made thousands of changes to the text of 1611. In vocabulary he incorporated amendments from another version from 1743, for example, fourscore changed to eightieth, neesed to sneezed, and the archaic crudled to curdled. In grammar he changed, among

Peter Jones

Ancient and modern | 13 November 2010

It was an assumption of much ancient Greek literature that sex between the older male and the young boy was the ultimate experience — for the older male. It was an assumption of much ancient Greek literature that sex between the older male and the young boy was the ultimate experience — for the older male. But since the hunt for this nirvana was bound to end in failure, the advice was to forget it. You would just make a complete prat of yourself. Those who fell into the trap — especially elderly males yearning hopelessly after beautiful young boys — were the subject of endless mockery from friends and

The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 13 November 2010

Home David Cameron, the Prime Minister, visited China with four Cabinet ministers and 43 business leaders. He said he hoped for ‘greater political opening’ in the country. A £750 million order for Rolls-Royce engines and a £45 million order for pigs were announced during the trip. A Special Immigration Appeals Commission upheld an appeal by Abu Hamza, who is in jail, against an attempt to remove his British citizenship. There were three nights of rioting at Moorland prison, south Yorkshire. The bishops of Fulham, Ebbsfleet and Richborough, and two retired bishops, announced that they were joining the Catholic Church as members of an ordinariate allowing the use of ‘liturgical books

Peter Hoskin

Whatever happened to Labour’s economic message?

For some weeks now, Labour have struggled to project a clear voice on the economy. You can see what they’ve been trying to do: pitch themselves as an alternative to immediate, deeper cuts, whilst also accepting the requirement to deal with the deficit. But, as I’ve said before, this all too often comes across as nervous equivocation; a kind of “on the one hand, on the other hand” stuttering that won’t persuade many observers either way. You sense that Team Miliband have tried to correct this in recent weeks, with a few punchier performances, but, even then, mistakes and deceptions have greased into their offering. Anyway, I mention this because

Peter Hoskin

The Gove reforms grow even more radical

Local authorities are already doing their utmost to block the coalition’s schools reforms, so just how will they respond to this story on the front of today’s FT? It reveals how Michael Gove is planning to sideline local authorities from the funding of all state schools – not just free schools and academies. The idea is that state schools will get cash directly from the state, without any need for the council middlemen that currently control the system. Here’s an FT graphic that captures the change: The money would be allocated to schools in proportion to the number of pupils they have, and headmasters would have much more freedom in