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Between 1992 and 2002, the UK experienced a period of benign economic growth. Known as the Nice (non-inflationary constant expansion) decade, it feels like a very long time ago. According to the Bank of England’s latest forecast, Britain today faces the opposite: high inflation and a recession. This grim prediction is why the Tory leadership contest is so grouchy; in these circumstances, there are no good fiscal options, only least-worst ones. The world economy veers from one emergency to another, with the frequency of crises having intensified since 2008 and, particularly, since Covid. Lockdowns and pandemic disruption were rapidly followed by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which is causing havoc in energy markets.

‘Truss’s campaign to be Britain’s next prime minister,’ wrote one political commentator this week, ‘seems to have unstoppable momentum. She has won the backing of heavyweights Tom Tugendhat, Brandon Lewis and the Chancellor, Nadhim Zahawi.’ Across a range of commentary you will see that word ‘momentum’ used in this sense in the weeks ahead. I am uncomfortable about what drives it. You may realise that if I were still a member of the Conservative party I would be voting for Rishi Sunak this month. Of the two candidates he is plainly less likely to win. So you may well think my discomfort with the procedure by which Liz Truss has been pulling ahead is sour grapes. Perhaps it is – we are seldom the best judges of our own motives.

In theory, the Conservative leadership contest could have stretched to the autumn, but the 1922 Committee and CCHQ decided to crunch the timetable due to the sheer number of crises facing the country. So Tory MPs had only a fortnight to choose the final two candidates, which did perhaps change the course of the race. Given the support that Kemi Badenoch managed to raise in a short period, it is not hard to imagine her being in the last two if she had been given more time to make her case. A longer contest would also have allowed the Tories more time to think about what changes they need to make if they are to win a fifth term. But for all the problems posed by a short competition, the essential logic of that judgment holds.

If you happened to be walking through Southwark this week you might have been accosted by a big public sign. ‘Hey straight white men’, the billboard bellowed, ‘Pass the power!’ Similar billboards apparently cropped up in other, equally squalid, parts of London. They are by a black artist from Marseille called Nadina. It will not come as a surprise to anyone who has seen her work to learn that Nadina is self-taught. Her other street art includes posters saying ‘Never forget George Floyd’ and ‘Nobody is free until Palestine is free’. It is brought to us by a gallery run, so far as I can see, by two white males. https://twitter.com/DouglasKMurray/status/1551643191086125057?

I was listening to a rich bastard on the radio explaining why he was feeling disinclined to give any more of his money to the Conservative party. The term ‘rich bastard’ is the one which I was habituated to use when I was a member of the Labour party and which I have disinterred now to give my opening sentence a little more punch. It was axiomatic to us that anyone with sufficient dosh to consider squandering a few hundred thou on a political party must be a bastard and was both immoral and undeserving of his wealth. Wealth in any shape or form appalled us in an almost Freudian fashion – Sigmund, you may recall, equated potty training with the accumulation of money, and the supposedly subconscious link between faeces and money has never quite been expunged from the left.

It is hard to love the Conservative party. But one reason it has at least always commanded a certain amount of respect is thanks to its reputation for ruthless efficiency. Personally I have found that reputation to be only half true. It is true that the party can be ruthless, but only in being ruthlessly inefficient. Look at the mechanism by which it removed the Prime Minister who brought it its largest majority since Margaret Thatcher. True, Boris Johnson had his faults. But did the party not know these in advance? Why was it not able to add the stabilisers so obviously needed to keep a rickety, not to mention rackety, figure in the top job once it had placed him there? It should cause no surprise.

The hardest thing for any political party to achieve is renewal in government. The Tories have managed it twice since they came to power in 2010. In 2016 and 2019 they changed leader – and tack – to adjust to new political realities. Their effort in 2019 was more successful, winning them their biggest majority since 1987. At both points, it was obvious that a shift on Brexit was what was required. What about this time? The answer isn’t so clear. In some ways this leadership race is the first discussion the Conservatives have had about their ideological direction since the 2005 leadership contest between David Cameron and David Davis when the party was in opposition. In 2016 and 2019, Brexit and personality so dominated the race that few other issues were discussed.

Scandal is such a wonderful driver of human emotions. Just think of the number of things you get to feel in one go: horror, disgust, relief, superiority, guilt and glee, to name just a few. All these flooded through a portion of the American public again this week when a new video emerged of Hunter Biden. Hunter is the sole surviving son of President Joe Biden and it is uncontentious to say that he is a tortured soul. His mother and his one-year-old sister died in a car crash in 1972. Hunter and his older brother Beau were injured but they survived. Beau died of cancer at the age of 46, and soon afterwards Hunter started a short-lived relationship with his elder brother’s widow. In between he also developed a serious drug and prostitute addiction.