History continues to be made in France following Nicolas Sarkozy’s election as president last month. Yesterday’s first round parliamentary elections were an absolute triumph for his centre-right UMP party, which annihilated the Socialists. Prior to Sarkozy’s election, the UMP party and government were deeply unpopular; the turnaround since has been truly remarkable and probably unprecedented
The abortion debate continues, but with the continued absence of the key statistic. How many pregnancies in this country end in an abortion? In my experience, people guess at around 10% or lower. In fact it’s is one in four in England (26.1%) and one in three in London (33%). It’s hard to consider these
This primer in the New York Times on what jihadis consider to be the rules of war is fascinating. Seemingly the only restrictions are that, with the exception of Iraq, you can’t kill in the country where you live unless you were born there and that you have to get consent from your parents for
Malan is an anti-racist Sir: As a South African liberal, I regard both Rian Malan and Ken Owen with the highest affection and respect. However, Owen is completely wrong and Malan completely right in the matter of the South African government’s approach to Robert Mugabe. Owen is talking nonsense when (Letters, 2 June) he suggests
I caught the end of the Darcey Bussell farewell after an evening at the birthday party of Blair’s departing head of communications, Ben Wegg-Prosser, an event attended by many of the ur-Blairites who were there from the very start in 1994. Watching the tearful ballerina dodging flowers thrown by the adoring fans, the curtain calls,
‘We will have to get new targets in Europe,’ Vladimir Putin said in an interview last week. ‘Which weapons will be used …ballistic missiles, cruise missiles or some completely new systems — that’s a technical matter.’ The apparent purpose of this outburst was geopolitical blackmail. Ostensibly at least, the Russian President was warning George W.
This essay by Shiv Malik in Prospect about the lead 7/7 bomber Sidique Khan is an absolute must read, it is one of the best thing I’ve ever read on the whole subject of what radicalises young British Muslims. Do read the whole thing but this part of the conclusion gives you a taste of
It is easy to denounce the media for the amount of attention that they devote to Paris Hilton’s antics, to rail against the cult of celebrity and the like. But what this doesn’t explain is why people who couldn’t pick a d-lister out of a Heat line-up and normally don’t give two hoots about celebrity culture
I have yet to capitulate to this series of Big Brother, which is not to say that I won’t. But it does seem very striking to me that the reality TV show seems to have become the canvas upon which we observe the nation’s residual bigotries and (in the case of Shilpa’s victory) our desire
If you want a sense of how an Obama candidacy might shake up American politics, consider this: John McCain’s ad man, who was Bush’s media adviser, has reportedly told the campaign that he can’t work for it if Obama is the Democratic nominee. He wouldn’t want to destroy the hope that, he feels, Obama represents. What
A truculent, argumentative blonde drama student called Emily has just been kicked off Big Brother for saying to the even more truculent and argumentative black WAG wannabe Charley – as they danced – “Are you pushing it out, you n***er?” Emily protests that it was a joke, Charley – who has been known to use
Reading James Delingpole’s fine piece about ‘the best music festival in the universe’ brought it all flooding back. Twenty years ago, buoyed by rave reviews such as James’s, I headed for Glastonbury full of starry-eyed hope and excitement. What followed were three days of unremitting misery, memories of which haunt me to this day. Torrential rain,
My book of the moment is Mark Law’s brilliant exploration of judo, The Pyjama Game (Aurum). A specialist book on a marginal sport? Not at all. There is something about the “gentle art” (in which I used to dabble a little) – throws, hold-downs, strangles, and arm-locks – which absorbs and changes people. Vladimir Putin,
Prince Bandar, the Saudi royal whom the BBC is alleging received huge sums from BAE during an arms deal, was a phenomenal Washington operator when he was Saudi ambassador there. Part of his success was that he was never afraid to be generous as this anecdote illustrates: “A few nights after he resigned his post as
“You wanna translate?” said President Bush as he concluded his remarks standing beside the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel. No need: it was quite clear from Dubya’s repeated bland thanks to Merkel for her “leadership” that the message had already been passed over. No specific deal on carbon emissions, at least not this time. Merkel had
If you think that England will never win a major trophy under Steve McClaren, and everyone pretty much accepts this, then shouldn’t we all be hoping England lose tonight? An England defeat would see the manager out of a job. But then again knowing the FA they’d probably find someone even worse to replace him
The other morning I came into work after one of those awful tube journeys that put you in the foulest of tempers. So it didn’t improve my mood to see a staged picture of Gordon travelling on a pleasantly full Tube train staring out at me from the papers. The Chancellor had, conveninently, found a
My first job was working for Index on Censorship, so I instinctively recoil from prior restraint of the media. Nonetheless, there is a difference between censorship and humane editing, and the defence of free speech ultimately depends upon society understanding the distinction. I can see absolutely no merit in Channel 4 broadcasting the photographs of
Politics in Washington can be an unpleasant affair. But the news that Scooter Libby, Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, has been sentenced to 30 months in jail for perjury and obstrucion of justice during the investigation into the outing of the CIA agent Valerie Plame is particularly sickening. This whole case has been an absurdity
A new opera is a major undertaking for any company and one of the challenges is that staff responsible for raising money, enticing audiences and selling tickets can’t know exactly what they’re dealing with in advance. No handy recording to listen to, no DVD of a previous production to slip into their laptops. The problem