Society

The 24 point lead the Tories have in this month’s Ipsos/Mori political monitor is their largest since the survey began after the 1979 election. The 48 percent they scored is the highest they have ever been in opposition and their best performance since January 1988 when they were at 50 percent—their highest ever score.  By contrast, Labour’s 24 percent is its worst ever performance in the monthly survey. For those interested in comparing how the Tories are doing compared to New Labour in opposition, in 1995 Blair’s Labour party was consistently scoring in the mid to high fifties. But in every election apart from 1987, Labour has underperformed its poll

The GCSE results debate today will be full of the usual accusations of grade inflation from critics and celebration of better teaching by the Government. However in the Times Lord Adonis has tried to open a wider debate on education. His most eye-catching point is that pupils leaving school at 16 is unacceptable and that we need to “eliminate dropping out”. The need to encourage pupils to stay in education for as long as possible is one of Labour’s main crusades. But why is this so important? Adonis says that criticism of new vocational subjects is “class-based elitism that instinctively wants to ration success and cap the aspirations of the

After David Miliband wrote his infamous Guardian article, the Brownites had two options. Either they could welcome it as important contribution to the debate and try and laugh off the idea that it was the beginning of a leadership challenge or they could go on the attack, painting Miliband as disloyal and try to force him to back down. The Brownites, though, attempted a mix of the two strategies when they are mutually exclusive. Things have now gone too far because of both the initial briefing against Miliband in the Evening Standard and his appearance on the Jeremy Vine show for the hug him close approach to work. So, when, as

This’ll set tongues wagging: Hillary Clinton’s younger brother met with Carly Fiorina, the chair of the Republican party’s Victory 2008 committee, at a private gathering in Pennsylvania. The event was hosted by the national director of the Citizens for McCain coalition. In the grand scheme of things this isn’t that important, but it re-injects the Clintons into the story at a time that Barack Obama is perceived to be struggling. (The story is, predictably, going crazy on the internet). Although Obama still leads in most polls his advantage is a narrow one, one poll today even has McCain up by five, and there are a few grumblings out there about

Reihan Salam, a Spectator contributor, has a good piece at The Atlantic. In it, he conducts a thought experiment that is worth reflecting on: “It’s worth wondering what might have happened had Musharraf taken a different path. During a landmark speech in January 2002, Musharraf essentially declared war on the Islamic extremists who’d been hollowing out the Pakistani state from within. Popular support for the government – and for the government’s decision to side with the United States – was extremely high. The United States and its allies had offered a generous aid package, and the Islamists were at their weakest. Had Musharraf sought a power-sharing arrangement with the secular