Fraser Nelson is a Times columnist and a former editor of The Spectator.
It’s a mistake to focus on the dodgy dossier, says Fraser Nelson. Blair’s real crime was to invade Iraq with no strategy, no understanding of the Islamist factions and no qualms about leaving Iraqis to the mercy of death squads There has always been a faction of the Labour party that wanted Tony Blair in
Iran. That’s the news story which poor Mr Blair is trying to spin to the panel – but they don’t pick up on his hints. It would have all been all right in Basra – he’d like to say – if it hadn’t been for those pesky Iranians. As Prime Minister, if he blamed Iran
So, what do we make of round one? Blair looks younger, in a strange way. A shorter haircut. But all those thespian mannerisms that I had forgotten about are still there – and are being used to full effect. A complete mastery of his facial expressions – which, for Blair, do the communicating. He can
As Tony Blair prepares to sit in the dock tomorrow, I suspect he knows he’ll walk it. The focus is on the case for war and how it was spun – which will be his Mastermind specialist subject. Nor will anything new be uncovered. As one of the journalists whose summer holiday was eaten up
The News of the World has done its poll of marginal seats today (story here, Anthony Wells here) – a hugely expensive operation, but worthwhile because British elections are decided in marginal seats. National polling, while interesting, can be a misleading indicator of outcome. The result is that the Tories have a safe lead of
Well hello there, Rompuy. We haven’t heard much from the new EU president so far – he was upstaged by Barroso at the Copenhagen conference, showing that the EU stage only has room for one super-ego*. But with the Lisbon Treaty ratified, in defiance of public opinion in Britain (and Labour’s manifesto pledge), he now
The Tories have said plenty to dismay me in the last few weeks, so I was delighted to pick up the FT today to see George Osborne talking sense – and boldness. Given that we have to increase taxes, it’s an obvious one to raise. The “too big to fail” principle means that the state
Oops! Britain’s inflation is heading back to 4 per cent territory as you’d expect with the Bank of England printing money and using the debt to finance government spending. If you create more money, you reduce the value of the money. Citi has done another brilliant research note, which it is putting online, laying
We have led the magazine this week on coming Tory defence cuts, with a brilliant piece by Max Hastings. Look closely at the cover image (our second by Christian Adams) and you can see the guillotine blade will hit he RAF and Navy guys before the Army. This, Hastings argues, will be the effect of
Sky has again given the BBC a lesson in how to produce documentaries. Ross Kemp in Israel last night was superb: not just grippingly produced, but actually balanced. Yesterday’s episode opened with Kemp on a tour with an Israeli taxi driver, who talks about the Palestinian terror attacks, the effects it has on his community
Here, CoffeeHousers, is my take on this morning’s Cameron interview: 1. General demeanor: excellent, articulate, confident. The complete opposite from Brown. It does make you think that he should wipe the floor with Brown in the TV debates. 2. “Last week we saw William Hague and George Osborne going to Afghanistan together. First shadow Chancellor,
Remember Peter Watt? No one in Team Brown did either –and that, it now turns out, was a big mistake. As general secretary of the Labour Party when the Blair-Brown handover happened (and cash-for-honours was in the air) he was in a brilliant position to know what went on. And, after being abandoned by all
One of the joys of living in Britain is watching the country fall apart when some snow falls. Trucks laden with your copies of The Spectator are, alas, no exception to this and we gather that many of our readers could face delays before receiving their magazines. So we have decided to put the
This morning, I drove past one of the Cameron adverts – “I’ll cut the deficit, not the NHS” – and that Bacacharch & David song came into my head: “What’s it all about, Alfie?” It’s been in my head, in fact, ever since his Oxford speech last weekend. Just what is the Big Idea? We
There are German operas that lasted longer than today’s Hoon-Hewitt plot. Launched at 12.45pm, given legs by the fact that ministers hate Brown too much to interrupt their lunches for him. But dead by 6pm due to Mandelson texting Nick Robinson. (Again, you can’t fault Mandy for drama). You feel the Tories should take Labour
It’s only been two hours, so how much can we read in to the silence from most of the Cabinet over the Hoon-Hewitt rallying cry? I didn’t think Brown was in that much trouble, until I heard Margaret Beckett come on Five Live to defend him. Is that the best his defence operation can do?
Say what you like about the Cameron project, but at least they are strongly committed to marriage. Aren’t they? Well, it seems, not now. I always suspected that the wonderful strength of Cameron’s rhetoric on marriage was not really matched by his policy – a rather paltry tax break. Now, it seems not even that
David Cameron can give rousing, mature, insightful speeches. Yesterday’s was not one of them. It used the word ‘hope’ 7 times and ‘change’ 27 times and that, I suspect, was its entire purpose – because there was precious little content in it otherwise. In the News of the World today, I describe the speech as
Happy New Year – and have a drink! That’s the message from the new year issue of The Spectator, where Leah McLaren has written a superb piece answering the Liam Donaldsons of this world. Here she is, in full flow: “Almost all of this country’s most famous names been unapologetic boozers. From Kate Moss to
“Did he know who you were? I mean, not to be disrespectful, but he has been away for two and a half years…” So Five Live’s Phil Wiliams asked David Miliband who was talking about his conversation with Peter Moore who has just been released from Iraqi captivity. Brilliant image. The guy gets out of
