Society

Thursday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Biden vs Palin: The Debate for Which the World is Not Yet Prepared…

You know what anticipation breeds, campers? That’s right, disappointment. Steel yourselves for a let-down. It’s almost inconceivable that tonight’s Brouhaha in Missourah can meet expectations. We’re not expecting a “debate” are we? We want a WWF show. Or, as the Politico boys put it: With all their potential for pitfalls and insta-classic moments, the pair has made the build up to the showdown, to take place here Thursday night at Washington University, feel more like a NASCAR race than a serious political forum: the audience may be tuning in as much in anticipation of cringe-inducing pile-ups as they are to watch the typical parry-and-thrust of debate. Expect Dullsville then. Which

James Forsyth James Forsyth

If Palin chokes tonight the presidential race could be over

There are signs that the presidential race is on the verge of tipping decisively Obama’s way. A string of polls in battleground states have shown Obama moving into strong leads and even those swing states like Missouri and Florida that were leaning McCain are now going Obama’s way. In a sign of the McCain’s campaign difficulty, McCain is reportedly pulling out of Michigan—long regarded as his best chance for flipping a large, normally Democratic state—which would seriously limit his options for getting to 270 Electoral College votes. One of the reasons that the McCain campaign is in such trouble is Sarah Palin. She has gone from being an asset to

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Reshuffle rumours | 2 October 2008

The financial crisis has rather got Brown out of his reshuffle hole. The word in Westminster is that there will be a relatively minor reshuffle tomorrow. To my mind, the most interesting question is who will Brown make Chief Whip? That choice will give us a good idea of how secure Brown thinks his position is and how he intends to handle the rebels, who haven’t gone away but are just biding their time. Anyway, here’s a little list of the speculation that’s out there: John Hutton to move from BERR (Telegraph) Hillary Benn to go from DEFRA (Boulton and Co) Tony McNulty to Chief Whip (The Sun) There’s a

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Cameron shouldn’t be so complacent about the quality of his top team

The Telegraph is reporting that David Cameron won’t reshuffle the shadow cabinet. This is a mistake. There’s some dead wood in the shadow cabinet that needs chopping out – last year The Spectator revealed that Cameron only thought 10 of its members were up to being ministers – some apparent conflicts of interest that need resolving and some talent that needs including. Cameron should start by telling his top team that the level of scrutiny on them is going to be turned up in the coming months so any second jobs that could in anyway be seen to overlap with their responsibilities must go. Anyone who isn’t prepared to comply with

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Glowing press coverage for Cameron’s speech

Team Cameron will be beaming about the press coverage that the  speech has garnered. The Sun pretty much endorses Cameron in a leader entitled ‘He’s ready.’ It offers him The Sun’s highest praise, declaring that his “speech could have been lifted straight from a Sun editorial.” The Mail is not quite as keen but does appear to be warming to Cameron.It concludes that “Mr Brown has an increasingly impressive rival for Number 10.” The traditionally conservative broadsheets, yes I know but there isn’t another word for them yet, give the speech a good review too. The Times writes that “His pitch for the top job was formidable enough that it

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Senate passes the bailout bill, the House expected to vote Friday

The revised Paulson plan passed the Senate by the comfortable margin of 74 to 25 with both Obama and McCain voting for it. Most people expect that the House will now OK it on Friday, the addition of various tax breaks and an increase in the Federal Deposit Insurance limit have made it more palatable to House Republicans who voted against it by a two-thirds margin on Monday.

Wednesday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Quote for the Day | 1 October 2008

Comes from that wise bird, Tyler Cowen: 11. If someone is pushing conclusions and not identifying the potential weak points in his or her arguments, be suspicious.  Also beware of anyone pretending to offer you simple answers. He’s referring to the current finanical crisis, but of course this is broadly true of any public policy question.

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Change We Can Believe In?

Ben Brogan suspects the financial crisis is an advantage for Gordon Brown. Perhaps it is. In the short-term. Make that in the very short-term. But in the medium to long-term it’s another millstone dragging him to the bottom. Danny Finkelstein is, I believe, correct: This election will not be fought in the middle of a crisis. It will be fought in the depressed aftermath that results from the crisis. The politics of these two moments are quite different. In a crisis people will be small ‘c’ conservatives, clinging to experience. They fear losing what they have got. But the literature on loss aversion suggests that in the depressed aftermath, when

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The fundamentals still favour Cameron

The financial crisis might be giving Gordon Brown a temporary boost but when you consider the issues the next election is likely to be fought on you see that Cameron has quite a distinct advantage. By the time of the next election, the economy will be—or will have been—in recession, shining a light on Brown’s actual economic record and making it harder for him to claim that all the trouble has come from America. Huge amounts will still have been spent on public services without the desired results and the problems of a broken society will, sadly, still be with us. This is not where the Tory advantage ends. As

James Forsyth James Forsyth

A good speech but not a decisive one

The continuing inability of any politician to seize the moment produced by this financial crisis continues. David Cameron’s speech today was fine—well crafted and delivered with just the right amount of passion—but an opportunity to demonstrate his command of the economic question was missed. It was always going to be impossible for Cameron to top the drama of last year’s effort and he was sensible not to try. The section on his personal values was strong and a reminder of how good he is going to be on the campaign trail during the general election. His remarks on the NHS conveyed the right amount of anger and passion. While his

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Cameron’s chance

These are not the circumstances that David Cameron would have wanted or expected to deliver his conference speech in. But today does provide him with an opportunity to show the electorate that he is ready to lead in these economically challenging times. Up to now, talking about the economy has not been Cameron’s strong point. For a PPE graduate and former Treasury special advisor he sounds oddly hesitant on the subject. (Perhaps this is why he turned down the shadow chancellorship when Michael Howard offered it to him after the 2005 election defeat). But Cameron must now show that he can do it, as the economy is going to be

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Liabilities

Martin Wolf’s column in the FT this morning well-worth reading, one statistic in it really does bring home the problem of over-leveraging: “the gross liabilities of the US financial sector have soared from just 21 per cent of gross domestic product in 1980 to 116 per cent in 2007.”

James Forsyth James Forsyth

McCain and Obama head to Washington to vote for the bailout bill

The Senate is expected to vote on a mildly revised version of the bailout proposal sometime today. The bill will include tax breaks for both businesses and people designed to help the bill garner more support in the House when it returns there. With both Obama and McCain backing the bill as well as the leaderships of both parties, the plan should pass the Senate comfortably.

James Doran

Can Comrade Hank find a way through this crisis?

The US Treasury chief sees his interventionism as a case-by-case response to unprecedented events, says James Doran, but his critics see it as inconsistent, dangerous and ‘un-American’ It’s hard to keep up with Hank Paulson, the grim-faced US Treasury Secretary and would-be architect of a new financial order. Over the past eight months, since the collapse of the investment bank Bear Stearns, Paulson has been confronted with an escalating crisis that has engulfed Wall Street, plunged markets into chaos, and threatened to push the global economy into deep recession. And at each milestone on the road to ruin, Paulson — Hermes-like — has presented a different face. When he accepted

Giles Coren

Potty-mouthed and proud

Swearing and shouting are underrated, says Giles Coren. Four-letter words can be immensely satisfying and extraordinarily effective When I was ever so small and sweet, romper-suited and frilly-booted and really quite an angel to look at, I must have had a gob on me like an angry plasterer, because the only piece of advice I can remember my mother ever giving me is: ‘If you’ve got nothing nice to say, Giles, then keep your mouth shut.’ This was most often said at table, I think, when I was passing comment on the ickiness of the boil-in-the-bag cod mornay or the pooey colour of the butterscotch Angel Delight, perhaps on the

Simon Caldwell

Sex, lies and apparitions

The Medjugorje story begins early in 1976 when a Franciscan monk in the former Yugoslavia, Father Tomislav Vlasic, starts an affair with a nun who becomes pregnant. Frightened he will be exposed as the child’s father, Father Vlasic persuades her to move away to Germany. She hopes he will honour his promise to leave the ministry and marry her. She writes a sequence of increasingly anxious letters when this does not happen, telling her former lover she is so miserable that she is praying she will die in childbirth. But he piously orders her to ‘be like Mary’ and accept her destiny in a foreign land — and never to

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