Society

Saturday

Mary Killen

Dear Mary | 26 September 2009

Q. Can you please advise. If you have been invited to meet someone at a club or a restaurant for a meeting or get-together, and you arrive before them (either because you are early or they are late for some reason), is it polite to accept the offer of a drink from the staff and make yourself comfortable? Or is it better manners to wait until your host arrives but then risk the embarrassment of their discomfort which has been added to by your own fastidious manners and patience? Assuming they are going to pick up the tab (it was definitely their invitation) one wouldn’t order a glass of champagne,

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Revisiting the BNP conundrum

I do miss not being behind the counter at CoffeeHouse as much now that I’ve moved back of shop. You don’t get much BNP debate in the mainstream media – which is, of course, part of the problem. So I thought I’d respond to the comments from my recent post via another post.   Jeremy Watson and Vulture ask why I’m so keen to trash the BNP and Griffin – and ask if I’m guilty of the same kneejerk liberal reaction that I accuse others of. A fair point: ‘racist’ can seem like a playground chant, and any rebuttal of the BNP needs more detail to be credible. The Westminster

Peter Hoskin

Balls tries to force the tax debate

Ok, ok, this will be my final post today on a Labour interview, but it’s worth highlighting the Guardian’s chat with Ed Balls.  Breakfasting CoffeeHousers may not make it past the opening image of the Schools Secretary, “half-naked on a desolate main road in Knowsley,” so here’s the key passage from later in the article: “[Balls] believes the Tories have made a big error after abandoning plans to match Labour spending commitments as Cameron makes clear he would like to reverse three big tax changes – the 50p top rate, due to be introduced next April; the 0.5% increase in national insurance contributions, due to be introduced in April 2011;

Peter Hoskin

Prescott lashes out

Another post, another interview with a Labour figure.  This time it’s John Prescott’s conversation with Michael Savage in the Independent.  Prescott puts in a fiery performance, and lashes out at almost everyone and everything within his party.  I’ve pulled out some of his attacks below, for the benefit of CoffeeHousers: On the Labour Party: “There is no direction in campaigning – we are drifting ….  So there’s a feeling in the party that, somehow, we’re not getting a grip on it. There is something lacking.” On Harriet Harman: “If I was being honest about it, I think too much of [her] emphasis has been on female rights…” On Labour’s campaign

Peter Hoskin

Johnson’s sense of timing

Remember when Alan Johnson said he doubted that he would have been “good enough” to lead the Labour party?  Or when he claimed that his defeat by Harriet Harman in the deputy leadership race had killed the “little bit of ambition” he had left?  Well, the tune has slightly changed since then.  In today’s interview with the Guardian, the Home Secretary still downplays his ambition but adds that he won’t rule himself out of future contests: “I haven’t got the ambition, and I haven’t got the self-confidence, and I haven’t got that real aching desire to lead. Which really is an essential quality in a leader. So I don’t think

Rory Sutherland Rory Sutherland

The Wiki Man | 26 September 2009

If the definition of a true communist is someone who would willingly live for a month in 1970s Poland, the definition of a true capitalist should be anyone who could spend a month in Las Vegas while reading nothing but Hammacher Schlemmer mail order catalogues. Even hardened materialists can find American consumerism a little much. A bizarre-looking $300 item I once saw turned out to be an oriel window for your cat. (The idea is that you fix this to your window frame so it protrudes through the sash window of your 32nd floor apartment, allowing your pet a 180° view of the outside world.) But there is a good

Lucy Vickery

Competition | 26 September 2009

In Competition No. 2614 you were invited to submit a press release by the tourist board of one of the following fictional holiday destinations: Lilliput; Wonderland; Oceania; Brave New World. The entry was split fairly evenly between the first three destinations, while the prospect of trying to entice visitors to what Huxley referred to as a ‘negative utopia’ left you cold. Well, not quite: a solitary cheerleader in the wilderness was Susan McLean, who made a spirited if ultimately unconvincing case for ‘a vacation from morality’. Lilliput and Wonderland were undoubtedly easier to sell than Oceania, but a doughty few pulled off the impressive feat of making Orwell’s totalitarian horrors

Matthew Parris Matthew Parris

Another Voice | 26 September 2009

I’m thrilled to the core by the magnificent tribe whose talents shine the world over There’s something about a flesh-and-blood entertainer doing his nut in front of a flesh-and-blood audience that thrills me to the core. I’ve no idea why. Maybe because my great-grandfather was a pantomime dame. Maybe because I’m a far-flung twig on the Littler family tree — the dynasty that includes Emile and Prince Littler, impresarios who dominated music hall and pantomime in the first half of the last century. Whatever the reason, and despite (perhaps because of?) the fact that I have not the ghost of a talent myself at standing up to entertain, I see

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Parliamentarian of the Year | 26 September 2009

James Forsyth invites you to submit nominations for the Spectator Readers’ Representative in our Parliamentarian of the Year Awards ‘MP in Public Service Shock. Politician found to be honest and hard-working. Wife standing by him.’ As the MPs expenses scandal dominated the front pages for month after month, one half expected to see a headline like this. The reputation of MPs dropped further and further with every revelation about claims for duck houses, moat cleaning and phantom mortgage payments. By the end of the affair, 84 per cent of voters thought that MPs put their personal and their party interest ahead of the national interest. Restoring the public’s faith in

Matt Ridley

The real origin of Darwin’s theory

Last week, snorkelling into a small bay on Chatham Island (San Cristobal), I looked up from watching a sea lion twist and turn underwater between a novelist and a neuroscientist to see a large man dressed in an incongruous overcoat standing with his back to us on a rocky outcrop. I wiped my goggles and realised I was looking at a statue. Of Darwin, naturally. Lots of other people visited these islands — Herman Melville, for one — and Darwin was just the captain’s companion on a small naval survey vessel, but it is Darwin everybody remembers. Bays, birds and bushes all bear his name. The oddness of the Galapagos

Douglas Murray

‘A liberal mugged by reality’

Irving Kristol didn’t coin the term ‘neoconservative’ but he was the first person to run with it. Although it was originally intended as an insult towards those alleged to have abandoned their initial ‘liberalism’, Kristol wasn’t bothered with quibbling. ‘It usually makes no sense… to argue over nomenclature,’ he once said. ‘If you can, you take what people call you and run with it.’ Besides, ‘having been named Irving, I am relatively indifferent to baptismal caprice’. Some of the best qualities of Kristol — who died last week — can be gleaned from such casual phrases. His lightness of spirit, his acceptance that there are things you can do nothing about, and

The Spectator

How can Labour save itself?

Here at The Spectator, we take no pleasure in the misfortunes of others. Here at The Spectator, we take no pleasure in the misfortunes of others. Watching a once great political party flounder in this undignified manner is almost as painful to us as it must be to them. So in the spirit of comradely concern, we asked some of the country’s brightest minds to come up with one idea each to help Labour get back on its feet. Here are their suggestions: Tony Benn They must bring back into public ownership essential goods and services necessary for the development of a fair economy. Boris Johnson They are stuck with

Aidan Hartley

Wild Life | 26 September 2009

Kenya An image I will never forget is of Ben Freeth’s three little children on the front lawn of their farmhouse west of Harare with Comrade ‘Landmine’ and his gun-toting, drunken gang zooming up the driveway. The ZANU-PF attackers threatened to burn down the house that day if the white farmers did not leave. I was very nervous being there. But when I looked at Ben’s kids, they hardly flinched. They had taut, blank faces. Later, after I was safely overseas, the thugs returned to the Freeths with burning tyres after dark. They howled like hyenas, broke into the bedrooms and threatened to eat the children. This month Landmine’s gang

Friday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

US efforts to engage Iran appear to be over

New York The reaction of the Obama administration to the discovery of a secret, underground Iranian nuclear plant strongly suggests, as the Washington Post points out, that the administration has given up on engagement. Attempts to engage with the Iranian regime were always likely to be futile. But Washington had to show the international community, and the American public, that it had tried. The criticism you can make of the administration is that its effort took too long, nine months when the Iranian nuclear clock might have as little as 18 months left on it.  Now, the focus turns to sanctions. Can the UN pass sanctions that block gasoline imports, a

Alex Massie Alex Massie

How Much is Georgia Worth?

Vaclav Havel, Timothy Garton Ash, Bernard-Henri Levy and Adam Michnik are among those calling for the EU to take a stronger line with Russia on matters Georgia. They write: Looking at Europe today, it is abundantly clear that history has not come to an end and that it remains tragic. Twenty years after the emancipation of half of the continent, a new wall is being built in Europe – this time across the sovereign territory of Georgia. This presents a major challenge for the citizens, institutions and governments of Europe. Are we willing to accept that the borders of a small country can be unilaterally changed by force? Are we

Peter Hoskin

Getting ready for reform

Given their position in the polls, and the challenges that face the next government, it’s understandable that the Tories are turning their minds to the post-election period.  They’ve been meeting with high-ranking civil servants for months now, and have been hammering out the details and design of a cuts agenda.  But one of the most striking examples of the Tories’ preparedness is outlined in today’s Guardian: Michael Gove’s team has called in the lawyers to help draft their first education bill. From the details the Guardian gives, the prospective bill is much as you’d imagine.  For instance, it would remove some of the regulations which currently stand in the way

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Mackay and the special relationship

The news that General Andrew Mackay has quit over the government’s failure to properly equip the Afghan mission is significant. For one thing, it will have ramifications for the UK US military relationship. Mackay is the British general from whom General Petraeus feels he has learnt the most; Petraeus affectionately called him the “King of Scotland” in his Policy Exchange lecture the other week. Mackay’s departure will increase the US military’s concern about the war-fighting capabilities of the British military.

David Blackburn

Dereliction of duty

The Ministry of Defence is the subject of two very damaging stories this morning. First, there are twice as many former service personnel in prison than there were six years ago. And second, Major General Andrew Mackay, a former commanding officer in Helmand, who masterminded the recapture of Musa Qala, has resigned his commission. Mackay is understood to have been dismayed at the direction of the war and army restructuring. The Independent has the details: ‘Mackay was disillusioned with what he considered to be a failure to carry out adequate reconstruction and development in Helmand. He had said privately that British soldiers risking their lives in the conflict had been

Thursday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Nanny Dave & Lowered Expectations

Tom Clougherty makes a sadly good point: We can’t rely on a Conservative government doing much to fight the nanny state. On the contrary, what we’re promised is an army of local directors of public health, dedicated public health budgets, a bigger, stronger chief medical officer’s department, a “holistic strategy to focus public health across departments”, “a clear marketing plan to promote healthy living”, and a brand spanking new QUANGO – the Public Health Commission – to oversee it all. There was even talk a while back about an ‘NHS Health Miles Card’, where people would get ‘reward points’ for losing weight, which they could then redeem against fresh vegetables,

Wednesday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Obama Rejects Dr Pangloss. Unfortunately.

From Barack Obama’s speech to the United Nations today: Now is the time for all of us to take our share of responsibility for a global response to global challenges. If we are honest with ourselves, we need to admit that we are not living up to that responsibility. Consider the course that we are on if we fail to confront the status quo. Extremists sowing terror in pockets of the world. Protracted conflicts that grind on and on. Genocide and mass atrocities. More and more nations with nuclear weapons. Melting ice caps and ravaged populations. Persistent poverty and pandemic disease. I say this not to sow fear, but to