Society

Monday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Lessons in Punditry

Ross Douthat makes an excellent suggestion: I think it would be an excellent discipline for pundits deeply invested in the ideal of the “independent” politician to attempt, at least once a year, a column praising a public figure for taking an independent, maverick position with which they disagree. Obviously this applies to the blogosphere as well as to the talking heads on TV and newspaper columnists. I don’t think I’d actually agree with all that many of Senator Jim Webb’s positions, for instance, but I admire his willingness to state his mind, free from the cant and humbug in which politicians customarily swaddle their pronouncements.

The Spectator

Spectator.co.uk statistics: July 2008

Here are the July monthly traffic figures for Spectator.co.uk: Unique Users — 197,403 Page Views — 1,886,333 These figures represent an impressive year of growth across the site, and include your favourites: Coffee House, Melanie Phillips’ blog, Stephen Pollard’s blog, Clive Davis’s blog and, of course, the weekly magazine content. Thank you to all of our users for making it possible. Keep an eye out for the exciting new features we will be adding to Spectator.co.uk over the coming months.

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

A holiday farewell, and some thoughts about Coffee House

Many smokers I know say they aren’t addicted, they just choose not to stop. By the same token, I’m seeing if I can give up Coffee House for a fortnight as I take my summer holidays in Sweden. I was asked by a media reporter for the Sunday Herald newspaper last week if I mind when anonymous people attack my pieces online. On the contrary, I replied, it’s why I blog. When James Forsyth got Coffee House going for last year’s May elections, I had no idea I’d end up writing far more as a Coffee House barista than for the magazine. The comments are the pull. There’s something gratifying

Brian Cullen

Who is Solzhenitsyn’s dissident heir?

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the great Russian dissident, has died at the age of 89.  Solzhenitsyn gave a face – and a powerful voice – to the victims of Soviet authoritarianism, through books such as A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and The Gulag Archipelago.  His efforts earned him the Nobel Prize for literature in 1970. Solzhenitsyn revealed just how terrible the regime was that the West faced in the Cold War.  But who – if anyone – is highlighting the evils of the 21st Century world with such clarity and force?  Any ideas, CoffeeHousers?

Sean Martin

Who should be the next England cricket captain?

Coffee House seems to have a fair share of cricket fans, so I thought I’d canvass your views on who should be the next England test captain after Michael Vaughan’s resignation yesterday. The ECB are set to announce his successor at 13:00 today, and the smart money seems to be on Kevin Pietersen. KP’s certainly a great player. But, for me, he lacks the tactical nous and composure that, say, an Andrew Strauss captaincy could bring to the team. What do CoffeeHousers think?

Sunday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

The Broadcasting Archipelago

Lord knows, there are times when the BBC is a frustrating service. And then there are times when one is thankful for the Beeb given the alternatives out there. Consider these screen grabs, taken at 11.35pm UK time this evening. (Click on each for a larger, clearer image if you like. The point is that the BBC has the big news front and centre and the others, er, don’t.) BBC: Fox News: ABC News: UPDATE: At 1.35am, UK time, neither Fox nor ABC has Solzhenitsyn’s death prominently featured on their frot page.

Saturday

Taki

High Life | 2 August 2008

On board S/Y Bushido Around 20 years or so ago, Udai Hussein, Saddam’s boy, had some of his heavies beat up a man who refused their master’s invitation to join his table in a Geneva nightclub. The Iraqi wanted to meet the man’s beautiful companion, hence the invite. Although arrested, Udai got away with it by claiming diplomatic immunity. The Swiss caved in, as they often do in such cases. As Plato pointed out, money talks. The only good thing anyone can say about Udai is that he died like a man, as did his brother. Last week a scumbag who goes by the name of Hannibal Gaddafi, son of

Dot Wordsworth

Mind Your Language | 2 August 2008

After Padraig Harrington gave an interview to the Today programme the other day, Evan Davis, the presenter, commented that he had never heard the phrase ‘amn’t I’ before. Perhaps he has not been to Ireland. The Oxford English Dictionary does not seem to comment on the Irish character of the abbreviation. This interrogative form is cited only in illustration of another word entirely, in a quotation from the 1950s. Usefully, this makes the Irish link clear: ‘Haven’t I the art of a real Irish story-teller? Amn’t I the latter-day heir o’ the great bards and story-tellers?’ If one thinks of it, the English English form ‘aren’t I’ is just as

The Spectator

Letters | 2 August 2008

On Colombian ‘democracy’ Sir: Tristan Garel-Jones’s article misrepresents Justice for Colombia’s work by implying a common agenda with the Farc (‘The day I was kidnapped’, 12 July). JFC works to defend human rights in Colombia. We were the only British organisation to campaign for the release of Ingrid Betancourt. Last year we brought over Ingrid’s mother and relatives of other hostages, arranging events for them in Parliament, at the Law Society and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office — Lord Garel-Jones was invited but did not attend. He says Colombia is democratic, civilised and friendly, as we are sure it is if you are a visiting British dignitary. Unfortunately it is

Celia Walden

Diary – 2 August 2008

Every six months the tabloid press shakes its pudgy fist in ecstatic indignation over some new film (usually French and about as offensive as a French actress’s unveiled breasts). Last week, it was a British film called Donkey Punch which prompted the ever-raging question ‘Is this the vilest film ever?’ The answer, as with all headlines ending in a question mark, is no, but it is quite possibly the worst. The title, for those of you who missed the disgusted though voluble explanations in the newspapers, is a term used to describe a mythical, sado-masochistic sexual act. The storyline? A group of guileless, cerebrally bankrupt girls from Leeds head to

Tamzin Lightwater

Diary of a Notting Hill Nobody | 2 August 2008

Monday V nerve-wracking weekend. Thought I was going to get the sack for leaving the mike on during Dave’s meeting with Mr Obama. Wrote a long email of apology to Gary cc Nigel for accidentally forgetting to tell the ABC cameraman that it was pictures only, but Gary sent me a memo back, cc’d every-one, saying that my actions were ‘inspired and brilliant’ and ‘a shining example of the sort of initiative you should all be taking’. He keeps winking at me saying ‘accidentally eh?’ Decided to go along with it, although am nervous about why no one has worked out what a huge blooper I made. Now Gary says

Jeremy Clarke

Low Life | 2 August 2008

‘Gordon, can I have your autograph?’ I said, offering pen and small notebook folded back at a new page. I’d butted into his conversation, but he swung round in his seat and smiled pleasantly up at me and took the pen and notebook and inscribed his name. ‘You’re a great man, Gordon,’ I said, as I looked over his shoulder to watch him write. ‘I was behind the goal that night you saved the Geoff Hurst penalty.’ ‘You’re West Ham, then?’ he said respectfully. ‘I am,’ I said. Gordon Banks OBE returned my pen and notebook and then opened his right palm and presented it to me. The economy and

Melissa Kite

Real Life | 2 August 2008

The really useful thing about relationship break-ups is that you get to eat up all the out-of-date stuff in the fridge without fear of food poisoning. It took me a while to work this out. There was I going around moaning, ‘Oh, I want to die’, and it not occurring to me the many positive benefits of being in this morose state of mind. Until I came back from town one night having failed, again, to interrupt my state of mourning to go to Waitrose and, finding one piece of Nando’s chicken still in the brown paper bag on the third shelf down, hit upon an idea. I know, I

Richard Sennett

The Table | 2 August 2008

At a House of Commons cocktail party I suddenly noticed a friend’s face contorted like ‘The Scream’ of Edvard Munch. Could it be yet more bad news for Labour? No, she was being offered a plate of smoked salmon, probably her thousandth munch for the year. I entirely sympathised; the stuff usually served up is fatty and tasteless. But now that the fishing season is upon us, you can do something about it. Salmon was once so plentiful in the British Isles that a medieval journeyman’s contract specified it would be on the workshop in-house menu no more than three times a week. In modern times, c.1960, salmon stocks began

Toby Young Toby Young

Status Anxiety | 2 August 2008

There have been many wise and learned discussions about the impact the internet has had on journalism. However, one area that has been neglected is the impact it has had on the egos of journalists. I don’t mean the bruised feelings that Matt Drudge’s success has caused among the higher echelons of the American intelligentsia. I mean the terrible wounds inflicted on people like me by the ‘comments’ that appear beneath our articles. ‘What a load of self-interested tripe,’ wrote one reader underneath a diary column I wrote in the Daily Telegraph last week. Another expressed himself even more succinctly: ‘Bryony Gordon is away.’ As an experienced journalist, you tell

Mary Killen

Dear Mary | 2 August 2008

Q. I am sorry this is anonymous, but I volunteered to write on behalf of a good friend — call her Anna Finch — who is terrified at the prospect of being identified in the small conservative village where she has lived for a dozen years. Here is the problem: when A.F. moved to the village and looked for a char she was advised to engage a treasure who had lived in the village all her life, was related to most of the inhabitants and had an encyclopaedic knowledge of all the local tradesmen. The arrangement has lasted ever since, but the treasure has gradually become a passenger and now

Peter Jones

Ancient & modern | 02 August 2008

The recent exchange of the bodies of two Israeli soldiers for five living Hezbollah (and much else) has produced outrage in some sections of the Israeli press. Admittedly, it lays Israel open to further blackmail from Hezbollah who, glowing with high-minded idealism, long to capture and murder as many Israeli soldiers as they can. But the press is wrong. Last time, we saw how important it was for ancient Athenian families that their dead be properly buried and their graves tended. This was felt to be even truer of its soldiers who died in battle, whom Athenians deemed worthy of hero-cult. Breaking with the normal Greek custom of burial on

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Attention Edinburgh Readers!

And art lovers… If you find yourself in the Scottish capital this week you might consider popping in to the Flaubert Gallery in Stockbridge where you will find an exhibition of my sister’s excellent paintings. The show runs until August 10th.

Alex Massie Alex Massie

The Sad Glory of Mark Ramprakash

The test match at Edgbaston is bubbling up nicely. If they can snaffle Graham Smith’s wicket England will be favoured to mop up the South African tail and claim a victory that looked unlikely after their careless batting displays. Hurrahs for Paul Collingwood and, with the ball, Freddie Flintoff. UPDATE: OK, so that didn’t work out did it? But I’d have also been happy to have been at Headingly today where, in his 11th innings after he struck his 99th first-class century, Mark Ramprakash has made it to the top of the mountain. The 100 Century Club has a new member. What’s more, Ramps’ may be the last admitted to