All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
Apologies that the blog hasn’t been as regular as it should have been recently. The Jewish Chronicle has worked me hard in my first few weeks and I have been unable to keep posting as often as I would have liked. I have now decided to blog at regular times during the week. I therefore
Never meet your enemies; you might end up liking them. I’ve just got back from The Spectator Parliamentarian of the Year awards and the buggers had sat me next to James Purnell, about whom I was a bit snippy in print not so long ago. It was the usual measured, level-headed stuff about him being
Harriet Harman as the Spectator/Threadneedle parliamentarian of the year? When the judging panel started our deliberations, we had no idea we’d end up giving the top laurels to Harperson and Mandelson. Well, Mandelson as politician of the year was a no-brainer: you don’t need an explanation. He just is. He took over a government single-handedly.
Gordon Brown is in a nigh-on-impossible position on Afghanistan until President Obama makes up his mind about how many more troops he wants to send and what strategy he wants to pursue. Yesterday at PMQs, Brown said with a sense of relief that there would be a decision from Washington in days. The White House
Kevin Pietersen is an idiot. One day that will become endearing and amusing and we’ll look upon his daftness with fondness and so on. But that moment hasn’t arrived yet. So, for the time being, we look at Pietersen and wonder what on earth is going on. No normal person would tell the Times that:
The latest issue of the Spectator is released today. If you are a subscriber you can view it here. If you have not subscribed, but would like to view this week’s content, you can subscribe online now. Five articles from the latest issue are available for free online to all website users: A week after
Sure Barack Obama won the Presidential election last year. But he wasn’t the only big winner. Nate Silver, the number-cruncher behind FiveThirtyEight.com was another victor, having predicted the result with uncanny accuracy. Silver is a sabermetrician, which is to say that he began his public life as an analyst for the brilliant Baseball Prospectus years
Oh, this is splendid. Lord knows when it will be released in Britain, but a trip to Paris in the New Year to see this biopic of the great Serge Gainsbourg might be just the ticket. Here’s the trailer: And, for your additional delectation, here’s Serge performing La Chanson de Prévert:
Armistice Day suits Brown down to the ground. When everyone is obliged wear funeral-director garb, his grey hair and sombre jowls fit the mood perfectly while Dave’s polished and youthful glow looks a trifle out of place. Gordon performed confidently at PMQs today. So did Dave, as it happens, but the skirmish came to nothing
Apart from Barack Obama, that is. One way of measuring influence, in Washington, Whitehall or elsewhere, is to ask: how much damage would this person’s resignation do? By that standard, there are only two really, truly important people in the Obama administration: Hillary Clinton and Robert Gates. And only one of them has the power
Well, he’s the new Deputy Assistant Secretary for Iran in the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs who is, according to Melanie Phillips, a “fifth columnist” who is “in hock to the Iranian regime”. Melanie suggests that Limbert’s appointment means Tehran “now has its own man running the United States’s policy towards Iran” and
Stay tuned for live coverage from 1500. Later than usual this week because PMQs was pushed back as a mark of respect for Armistice Day. Serving soldiers are in the gallery to watch proceedings. I’m interested to hear Coffee Housers’ thoughts on all this. 15:04: Brown opens up by paying tribute to the Great War
Brother Blackburn’s suggestion that David Miliband risks, perhaps, being something of a Labour version of William Hague should he succeed Gordon Brown. And Danny Finkelstein’s column arguing that Miliband should change his mind and put himself forward for the post of EU High Representative is, in many, many ways, compellingly persuasive. But if Miliband were
The One Nation sentiments that David Cameron expressed at last night’s Hugo Young lecture have been almost uniformly applauded. Labour’s sneers about Cameron being an uber-Thatcherite are isolated from mainstream. Only Johann Hari dissents, suggesting that because Cameron is an OE and comfortably off it follows that ‘he has never known’ a poor person. Of
I’d forgotten what it felt like to read positive news about the British economy. To be honest life is full of much more thrilling experiences, but my lack of enthusiasm is partially explained by the fact that a 6,000 employment rise is not proof of recovery. That half the population of Cranleigh have found employment
David Miliband’s decision not to be a candidate for EU Foreign Minister has inspired an almost vociferous article from Daniel Finkelstein. He writes: ‘The Lisbon treaty is your work as much as anyone’s. You pushed it through and you told everyone that it really mattered. You’ve been making speeches on the importance of the new
The moment that stuck out for me from today’s PMQs came right towards the end, the exchanges between the leaders were not particularly enlightening. Gerald Howarth, a member of the Tory defence team, rose from the backbenches to tell the House of an email he had received from a friend of one of those men
There is something oddly comforting about discussing NATO’s Afghan mission in terms of kit, helicopters and troop numbers – or the lack thereof. These are tangible categories. You either have the right amount or you don’t. And if you don’t, then it is because somebody made the wrong decision or failed to make a timely
But only on the absurd row over his letters to the mothers and wives of soldiers killed in Afghanistan. Heck of a job, Sun. A Politics Home poll reports: And: And: In a way these results are quite comforting. Voters are rather more sophisticated and decent than the papers they read. Thank Christ for that.
Just returned from Cambourne, in Cambridgeshire – a town you may have heard of on account of its extraordinary (if you believe the press) birthrate, which is 100 times the national average, or something. It’s a new town, part of the government’s strategy to pave over all of western Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and those remaining
I had a pretty keen dislike of Gordon Brown long before it was popular or profitable to hold the Prime Minister in low regard, but it’s now obvious that the time for anger or disappointment or fury has passed. The only humane response to the Prime Minister’s predicament is pity. The grotesque, trumped-up, “row” over
This afternoon, I had the great privilege of hearing Geoffrey Robertson QC and Sir Ken MacDonald QC argue why English libel law must be reformed. Up to this point I had, along with most of the audience I suspect, assumed that reform would only benefit journalists. I suppose that illustrates just how narcissistic the profession
The warnings from around the world about the scale of the UK’s government debt crisis keep flowing in. Following last week’s warnings from the IMF and European Commission about the scale of the UK debt crisis, credit rating agency Fitch has described the UK as the AAA country most vulnerable to a downgrade. The table
Celtic supporters sung Irish “rebel” songs during the one minute’s Remembrance Day silence before the kick off of their game at Falkirk. Even more Celtic fans waited outside the turnstiles so that they would not have to take part in the commemoration. What an unspeakably foul club it is, bigoted and filled with sectarian hatred.
Watching Gordon Brown’s press conference you realise how on the ropes he is. The opening questions are all about the letter and Brown’s misspellings. Brown doesn’t have an answer that can shut this damaging story down and it is noticeable how he lacks the easy, public empathy of a Blair or a Cameron. Then the
David Cameron received a standing ovation after he proclaimed “Don’t dare lecture us about poverty”, illustrating that compassionate conservatism is a central issue to the Conservative party. Today, David Cameron will set out his blueprint to eradicate poverty, which, together with education reform and the promotion of the family, form the compassionate case. Cameron is
The Times tempted fate today with its splash boasting about the confidence and the strong pound. Fitch Ratings has today said that Britain’s AAA debt rating is more at risk than that of any other major nation because it needs “the largest budget adjustment” – ie, the most cuts – because Britain has the largest
It may have come ten years late, but Ed Miliband’s decision to bypass planning processes for nuclear plants is welcome. Britain faces unprecedented energy insecurity, with widespread power cuts predicted from 2017. Rather than trust Vladimir Putin not to turn the top-off whenever he’s feeling piqued, or to rely on the totally unreliable Colonel Gadaffi,
Good grief: All telecoms companies and internet service providers will be required by law to keep a record of every customer’s personal communications, showing who they are contacting, when, where and which websites they are visiting. Despite widespread opposition over Britain’s growing surveillance society, 653 public bodies will be given access to the confidential information,
Happily my Outrage Outage didn’t last long. Thanks, Robert Kaplan! Your Atlantic column on the fall of the Berlin Wall proved a most adequate tonic. You conclude your piece: What does the European Union truly stand for besides a cradle-to-grave social welfare system? For without something to struggle for, there can be no civil society—only
Despite his pronounced Europhile views, a Politics Home insider poll suggests that Clarke can remain in the Shadow Cabinet and join a prospective Euro-sceptic Cameron government. As Clarke is signed up to the Cameron plan, I doubt that Europe is necessarily the problem. Concern arises from Clarke’s apparent unwillingness to fulfil the duties of his
The row over Gordon Brown’s spelling mistakes in a letter to the mother of a soldier who had been killed in Afghanistan shows how badly run Brown’s Downing Street is. It is well known in Westminster that Brown’s handwriting is poor because of his bad eyesight. There is little that can be done about that
The extremely well-connected Jackie Ashley makes this astonishing prediction in this morning’s Guardian: ‘Some Labour people may think I’m sounding too gloomy, but those who have been privy to recent private polling are a lot more than gloomy. This suggests that Labour could return to the Commons with just 120 MPs or thereabouts, taking the
Alistair Darling did look slightly apprehensive when Gordon Brown gatecrashed the G20 finance meeting on Saturday. And how right Darling was: the Prime Minister’s Tobin tax proposal was met with gawping disbelief; it was as if Bernie Madoff had strolled into the room as the new head of the IMF. It is very telling that
