All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
There was a certain irony to the news that @CENTCOM had been hacked yesterday afternoon. While President Obama was giving a speech on cybersecurity, the U.S. Central Command Twitter account was spouting pro-Isis propaganda. Nothing new here, though. Since day one, Isis have used the internet to threaten the West and in particular American soldiers. During
For goods, as opposed to services, Britain has just joined the Eurozone deflation club. This morning’s figures show that goods (i.e., the stuff we buy) were 1pc cheaper in Christmas 2014 than Christmas 2013. Factor in services and still, UK consumer price inflation was 0.5pc in December, the (joint) lowest since records began in 2004 (pdf).
One of the obsessions that will only get worse over the next few months – along with checking every poll that comes out every day to see whether you’re six points up, four points behind, or level-pegging – is what ‘red lines’ the parties will set out for their Coalition negotiations. David Cameron has made
Flick Drummond’s campaign to win a Conservative seat in Portsmouth South has hit a bump in the road. Word reaches Mr S that plans for a set of campaign posters for Flick had to be revised after the Conservatives realised that from a distance the poster could be misread as -well, another word starting in F. The issue
From ‘The British Reply and American Comments’, The Spectator, 16 January 1915: We have not the slightest desire to punish American commerce or any neutral commerce. Our whole object is to destroy our enemies, and it is only so far as American commerce interferes with that object that we interfere with American commerce. That the
What is going on with the opinion polls? In his first national poll of 2015, Lord Ashcroft has the Conservatives six points ahead of Labour at 34 per cent — whereas Populus also have a new poll out today putting Labour five points ahead. And yesterday’s YouGov poll put both on 32 per cent. As the
The public can always tell an election is near when the photo opportunities start to increase. Just such an occasion occurred on the 10th anniversary of the Hunting Act in November, when the Parliamentary Labour Party office invited MPs to have a photograph taken, ‘with a large fox holding up a sign saying “Back the
Ed Miliband’s popularity may be at an all time low, but the leader of the Labour party is at least now moving in A-list circles. The Telegraph reports that Miliband recently enjoyed a supper at the mansion of Geoffrey Robertson QC, the human rights barrister, which both George and Amal Clooney attended. Mrs Clooney is a barrister
Could there be anything more offensive to feminists than the use of young girls as suicide bombers? I doubt it. And I imagine that’s exactly why the militant Islamist group Boko Haram has adopted it as the latest technique in its campaign to overthrow the Nigerian government and create an Islamic state. In April last year, when Boko
Despite being the heiress to a steel fortune, Margaret Hodge never stops criticising multinational corporations over their tax affairs including the use of offshore havens and complex company schemes that befuddle the taxman. BP, for example, reportedly has 85 subsidiaries in a variety of tax havens built up over many years. That has not stopped moaning Margaret taking a
Has the Mayor of London fallen on tough times? Mr S only asks after this photo landed in his inbox. On further investigation it transpires that Boris Johnson and Evening Standard owner Evgeny Lebedev had a sleepover on the streets of London on Friday night as part of the paper’s pledge to support charities ABF The Soldiers’ Charity and
Heaven forbid that such an atrocity should happen, but suppose white racists attacked a mosque today, murdering four people. Crowds gather to show solidarity with the dead. They profess support for their friends and families and their horror at sectarian murder. The assassins killed their victims for no other reason than they were Muslims. That
The latest competition invited you to take a leaf out of Hilary Mantel’s book and provide a scene that shows a well-known villain from history or literature in an uncharacteristically kindly light. Mantel has said that she was driven by a ‘powerful curiosity’ rather than by any desire to rehabilitate Cromwell. ‘I do not run
Why have the Conservatives left out immigration and the NHS – two of the three issues that voters consistently cite as the most important in forming their decision about who to back in the General Election – out of their list of six priorities? Among the deficit, jobs, taxes, education, housing and retirement there is
Last week I lost count of the number of times we’ve been told, pace the Charlie Hebdo murders, that we have no right not to be offended, that freedom of speech involves the possibility of criticism and ridicule of any religion; indeed, that it’s the flip side of religious liberty. Salman Rushdie, who has more right
From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 16 January 1915: Friday’s Times contains on its “leader” page an appeal to our soldiers by Sir William Osier in regard to inoculation against typhoid. He tells the soldiers in simple but stirring language that it is their bounden duty to keep themselves in as perfect a state
I don’t always agree with Peter Hitchens but this is by far the best piece I’ve seen on the political reaction to the Paris attacks. As far as Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are concerned, we must all sign up to these shibboleths: The attack was nothing to do with Islam. Almost all Muslims, here and
Following the success of the Tories’ last anti-UKIP strategy session, I’ve been leaked details of the latest election planning at CCHQ: […] I say, what’s the most damaging – and widely-held – perception about the Conservatives? Hmmm. That we’re the party for the rich? Most unfair, I think we can all agree. Right, moving on, what’s
It’s hard when a legend turns up to be judged: hard to judge it, hard on the legend. Everything suffers, maybe judgment most of all. How can we help being influenced— or at least forewarned to a critically unhealthy extent—by the national hysteria Fellini’s La Dolce Vita (‘X’ certificate) aroused in Italy early this year? Everything
Up to 0ne million people are expected to march through the streets of Paris today, in defiance of the terrorist attacks on the city during the past week. David Cameron will join the march, alongside approximately 40 other world leaders, including French President Francois Hollande. Security has been increased around the city, with more than 5,500 police
Dear Qanta, Our names are Andrew O’Keefe and Monique Wright, and we were the hosts who interviewed you on Weekend Sunrise. We were also partially behind the decision to invite you on to our show, having read about and admired your work for some time. It is with great sadness, and some surprise, that we
Today, on the Andrew Marr show, Ed Miliband repeated his porkie that David Cameron plans to reduce state spending to 1930s levels. When he first made this bizarre and obviously untrue claim, even your baristas here at Coffee House didn’t have 1930s spending data to hand. Now we do, so the extent of his deceit can be laid
Before Christmas, David Cameron tightened up the rules about ministers going overseas. He wanted them in this country campaigning as much as possible. But, unsurprisingly, his visit to President Obama in Washington this week hasn’t fallen foul of his edict. This trip to Washington is the source of much satisfaction at the heart of government.
Ed Miliband was on Andrew Marr’s sofa this morning, drawing 2015 battle lines. It all looked very encouraging – if you are a conservative, that is. Miliband started discussing the Paris attacks, saying he wants to give the security services what is necessary — but as MI5’s director-general said on Thursday evening, that means more
From ‘Lord Curzon’s Speech’, The Spectator, 9 January 1915: We are glad to record, though in no way surprised to find, that Lord Curzon takes a very serious and very clearly defined view of the duties of the Opposition during a period of national crisis. He recognized that part of these duties in war time can
Utterly brilliant piece by Brendan O’Neill at Spiked on what would have happened if Charlie Hebdo had been published in Britain, rather than in France. It does not strike me as being terribly far-fetched. Meanwhile, the BBC, yet again, has misjudged the story in its news coverage, wringing its hands over the treatment of French
From News of the Week, The Spectator, 9 January 1915: A Commission, under the chairmanship of Sir Ernest Hatch, has been appointed by the Government to advise and help local Refugee Committees in establishing workshops for Belgian refugees. In the recent Report of the Belgian Refugees Committee it was pointed out that the refugees were
Under the headline ‘Norway didn’t give into Islamophobia, nor should France’, Owen Jones writes on the Guardian’s Comment is free website that Norway’s response to the Anders Breivik massacre in 2011 ‘was not retribution, revenge, clampdowns’, and that ‘the backlash [Breivik] surely craved never came’. Norway, he writes, ‘stood strong’. But did it really? I’m
Reports are coming in from AFP that the two hostage situations in France are over. The Kouachi brothers, who are suspects in the Charlie Hebdo shooting, were killed in a raid on a printing works in Dammartin-en-Goele this afternoon. They had been holding one person hostage, who has now been freed. Police launch assault where #CharlieHebdo suspects
The end of the private management of Hinchingbrooke Hospital is not a dagger in the heart of NHS competition and reform. It does not mean, as the BBC’s business editor wrote today, that a private business cannot run an acute hospital (which is an extraordinary statement given that such businesses routinely do so in other
As I write a siege is ongoing in a Kosher shop in Paris. In France, Belgium and across Europe in recent years, Jews have repeatedly been the targets of Islamist attack. They always are. Last year saw the largest upsurge of anti-Semitic hate crime on record even in the UK. But it is the continent
After Wednesday’s attack on Charlie Hebdo, an argument doing the rounds was that it would have been better not to publish cartoons that were deliberately provocative when the magazines had already suffered violent attacks. Why should the journalists put themselves and others, including Muslim policeman Ahmed Merabet, at risk of death? Now two people are
Last night’s Question Time saw David Dimbleby chair a debate on freedom of expression following the Charlie Hebdo shootings. During the programme, Dimbleby stated that the BBC’s policy with regards to representations of Mohammed was to not depict the Prophet in any shape or form. This policy was met with criticism from panel and audience members alike. @bbcquestiontime that is utterly disgraceful
This morning’s announcement by Circle that it will be leaving the contract to run Hinchingbrooke Hospital makes it even more difficult politically for anyone who believes in greater competition in the NHS to make their case. Opponents of private sector involvement in healthcare provision will say – with good reason – that this shows you