Society

Wednesday

Michael Tanner

Confusing frolic

La Calisto Royal Opera House Tosca Opera North, Leeds It’s not often that you find the Royal Opera going as far back as the 17th century, no doubt for the good reason that operas written then are not suitable for performance in such large houses. That hasn’t daunted the director David Alden, who, together with his set designer Paul Steinberg, has located the action of Cavalli’s La Calisto in a grand hotel, with gods behaving badly in 1920s clothing. The era of the grand Art Deco hotel, with its atmosphere of illicit trysts and shady goings-on, is so potent that even when staying in a Travelodge I still have hopes

M R-D-Foot

Stage-effects in earnest

Churchill’s Wizards, by Nicholas Rankin Deception plays a large part in war, just as feinting plays a large part in sport. The British excel at it, and used it with much success in both the 20th century’s world wars, particularly in the second. That war’s conspiracy theorists are fond of suggesting even more deceptions than did in fact take place; luckily, there are now two sound history books by which they can be confuted. If a wartime deception is not mentioned either in Michael Howard’s Strategic Deception of 1990 or in Thaddeus Holt’s The Deceivers of 2004, it is hardly likely that it happened: useful sticks with which to beat

Tuesday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

When Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied.

Radley Balko is right. If this story isn’t the sort of cheery goodness you’ve been craving in these troubling, turbulent times then, well, what the hell’s wrong with you? It’s the sort of tale that restores your faith in the power of free enterprise and, frankly, the United States of America. To wit: State attorneys say John LaVoie should be forever barred from the massage business because he ran a house of prostitution camouflaged as a church. But in his latest court argument, the Tucson man says he hired women at Angel’s Heaven Relaxation Spa — near University Medical Center — not to sell sex but to comfort the afflicted

Alex Massie Alex Massie

The Bailout & I

I really don’t know enough to tell whether it was a good thing that the bailout plan failed yesterday or not. Mebbes aye, mebbes naw as a great man was fond of putting it. But the absurdity of a dozen Republicans changing their votes because wee Nancy Pelosi was mean about their daddy can only confirm the public’s low opinion of Congress and, in the end, damage the Republican “brand” still further.

James Forsyth James Forsyth

A crisis without a hero

A crisis presents politicians with an opportunity. But no politician on either side of the Atlantic has seized the one presented by the current financial turbulence. Gordon Brown is benefitting not from anything he has said or done but because he is ‘experienced’ and voters think that because he was Chancellor he must know the way home from here. David Cameron and George Osborne have made the right noises  and struck the right tone. But as opposition politicians they are limited in what they can do. They also have not been ahead of the curve on this. In the US, Bush’s leadership has been pitiful, Hank Paulson has been politically

Matthew Dancona

And in other news…

Amid all the justified clamour about the global financial crisis, let us not forget that (for instance) children will still have to be educated. So do read Michael Gove’s fine speech on his plans for a Swedish-style schools revolution, expanding on the themes he discussed in Fraser’s interview last week. As one Cameroon put it to me: ‘We can’t let the end of the world distract us from saving the nation’.

Peter Hoskin

Market Watch | 30 September 2008

Currently, the markets seem to be holding up as well as could be expected.  At the time of writing: — FTSE is at +0.44 percent — Dow Jones has opened around 2 percent up. — Nasdaq is at +2.48 — Dax is at -1.17 Perhaps the most significant financial indicator of the day is that Libor – the rate at which banks lend to each other – has risen to an all-time high.  In other words, it’s more expensive than ever for banks to borrow from each other – increasing the chances that more of them will need bailing out.

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Back at the House

There is talk coming out of Washington that the Senate will pass the bailout bill and send it back to the House, almost daring it to vote it down again. Speaking this morning, President Bush made it clear that he’s going to keep pushing for a bill, and enough House members might have been scared by yesterday’s fall on the Dow to get this passed second-time out.

Peter Hoskin

Market Watch

We’ll be providing market updates here on Coffee House and Trading Floor today, as the financial turmoil continues. So, just to recap: — The Dow Jones index closed at -6.98 percent yesterday evening. — Nasdaq closed at -9.14. — The Nikkei index closed this moring at -4.12 — Hang Seng closed at +0.76 And so far today: — After an early plummet, the FTSE is hovering around the 0 percent mark.  It’s currently at +0.17 percent. — Dax is at -0.98 Today’s biggest loser so far has been HBOS – at time of writing, shares in that company are down around 10 percent.  As Paul Waugh points out, that could be causing a few headaches

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Where will this end?

There are few events that can break through the conference bubble but the failure of the $700bn bailout has undoubtedly been one of them. Most worryingly, no one knows what happens next. In Washington, the bailout seems doomed. It was never politically popular to begin with and neither the Democrats nor the Republicans will want to cop the flak for passing it. It says something about President Bush’s lack of political authority these days that not only did House Republicans vote the bill down but only four of the Texas delegation voted for the bill. Indeed, politically it is hard to see what upside there is to voting for the

Peter Hoskin

Which party’s share price will plummet?

Questions abound after the financial panic yesterday, which saw the Dow Jones index experience its biggest-ever one-day fall and which has triggered similar drops in markets across the world.  Will a(nother) bailout package be agreed upon in the US?  How long might that take?  Will more banks collapse?  Have we seen worst of it?  Only the last of these can be answered with anything like certainty, and the most persuasive answer to it is: No. Less significant, but floating around nonetheless, are the political questions.  Who will benefit, and how?  Another poll this morning suggests that Labour might be capitalising from the turmoil – not only does it record a

Monday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Hobnobs for All

Via, Mr Eugenides, I see that, despite what you may think, it’s not all doom and gloom. Just occasionally good and wholesome news slips through the clouds, spreading sweetness and sunshine all around: Every person flying into Britain will be offered a free cup of tea and a biscuit in an ambitious, if eccentric, plan to make the country more cheerful. The hope is that tourists, and travellers returning from holidays, will be able to banish dark thoughts of a delayed flight, poor weather, and global financial meltdown if confronted with a free cup of English Breakfast tea and a plate of Jammie Dodgers. Apparently it’s an idea first proposed

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Ashcroft issue has to be resolved

The general consensus here is that the Osborne speech did the business: yet another hurdle has been cleared by the Tories. However, folk here are buzzing about tonight’s Dispatches programme on Tory funding. To my mind, the issue is not whether short sellers are donating to the Tories, but Lord Ashcroft’s tax status. It is a huge strategic liability–and one that a half competent Labour party would exploit–that the Tories cannot say whether one of  their vice-chairmen and major donors is domiciled in this country for tax purposes.   I know CoffeeHousers get irritated when the Aschroft issue is raised. But it is reckless for the Tories to let this

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Will Miliband ever live that photo down?

Dotted around this rabbit-warren of a convention centre are cut-outs of David Miliband based on that infamous photo of him posing with a banana.  The Tories might now not to get to run against Miliband, but he has replaced Nick Clegg as the man they love to mock.

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Osborne’s speech

This was new, serious George. In a soberly-delivered speech, Osborne went a long way to reassuring voters that he is ready to be Chancellor. He stressed financial and fiscal responsibility and deftly threaded the political needle on criticising the excesses of the City without committing to more regulation. Osborne was so keen to demonstrate his seriousness that he kept his trademark smirk under wraps. He even bit his lip during one bout of applause in a seeming attempt to stop it from breaking through. The headline from the speech is a freeze on council tax for two years. This will be achieved by returning government advertising and consultancy budgets to

Peter Hoskin

CoffeeHousers’ Wall, 29 September – 5 October

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 – provided 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

The Skimmer

Green confusion at the Guardian

Do folks at The Guardian not speak to each other? We’ve always known the place had a pretty poisonous atmosphere, but don’t they ever compare notes? This morning, left-wing harpie columnist Jackie Ashley writes this:  “Cameron has simply ditched his green agenda. On green taxes, persuading people to turn from cars and cheap air travel and even on issues like airport expansion and nuclear power, they have gone silent.”  Which can only mean she can’t have read this, by the paper’s excellent chief political correspondent, Nick Watts, on the front page of the same edition of the same newspaper:  “A third runway at Heathrow airport would be scrapped by a

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Your secret £67,300 second mortgage

The Bradford & Bingley bailout isn’t monopoly money. Americans lose no time translating their $700 billion bailout into a $5,000 per family figure, which I’ve heard Brits quote with a shiver in a kind of “there but for the grace of God go we” way. So just for the record, here are the liabilities run up on behalf of the average British household.   Net Debt £545bn £20,591 per household  (August ’08, ONS) Northern Rock £87bn £3,287 per household (June ’08, ONS) Bradford & Bingley £40bn £1,511 per household (Media reports) Public Sector Pension Liabilities £1,000bn £37,781 per household  (January ’08, Watson Wyatt) Future Private Finance Initiative payments £110bn £4,156 per household (March, ’08, Institute of Fiscal Studies)           TOTAL: £67,327 per household    

Sunday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Another Cabinet minister gets the treatment

Even though it is Tory conference week, I think the most important political story of the week might be the expected Cabinet reshuffle. If Brown gets it wrong, the chances of him being pushed out before the next election will increase dramatically. Judging from today’s papers, it seems that the Brownite poision is now being directed against James Purnell. This is unbelievably foolish. Purnell has been one of the very few successes of the Brown government and demoting him would likely prompt a rebellion in the Cabinet and the party. Brown’s principal reshuffle problem is that he can afford to move very few people but a minor reshuffle would be

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Tory task 

Martin Ivens has a fantastic column in The Sunday Times about what the Tories need to do this week in Birmingham. “Their task is to meld two seemingly contradictory messages into a seamless whole. First, they must steal two favourite words from Brown’s old lexicon, prudence and stability, and attach them to their own economic plans: a reassuringly small-“c” conservative message is required. Secondly, they have to offer a radical agenda of change in the public services. The charge that nobody knows what the new, slick Conservatives stand for can’t be allowed to stick.” The Tories need a set of promises that the voters understand akin to New Labour’s 1997