Leading article

The volcanic ash cloud over Britain, which for days kept nearly all aircraft grounded, was much more than an inconvenience. For many, it was a catastrophe. Businesses that rely on air-travel have been paralysed, weddings ruined, and tens of thousands of passengers stranded abroad or stuck at home. Yet for all the chaos — which appeared to be ending after air-space was officially ‘re-opened’ on Tuesday night – Eyjafjallajökull has had its upsides. As our enthusiastic poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, pointed out, the skies looked clear and calm, ‘as clean as white slate’, uncluttered by helicopters and 747s.

If economics is the dismal science, manifesto-writing must rank as a candidate for the most dismal of arts. Too often in recent times it has been a case of writing down the word ‘future’ and then throwing virtuous-sounding words such as ‘fairness’, ‘change’ and ‘all’ into the air and seeing in what order they land. Manifesto-writers ought to subject each sentence to a test: do not include any statement unless you can imagine your political opponents saying the opposite. The title of Labour’s manifesto sums up its intellectual exhaustion: which politician this side of the 19th-century would ever have opposed a ‘Future Fair for All’? That is what makes the title of the Conservatives’ manifesto so distinctive.

There is something about Holy Week that seems utterly baffling to those unfamiliar with Christianity. Why would Christians be so proud of the crucifix, the symbol of a defeated, slain Christ? Then there’s the sacrifice of Lent, the solemnity of Good Friday and the joy of the resurrection on Easter Sunday. All are difficult to explain to the generations that never learnt Bible stories at school. And over the years, Christians in Britain have learnt to stop trying to explain. In the face of an increasingly confident and aggressively secular society, churchgoing, especially among Anglicans, is becoming something one doesn’t talk about. Roman Catholics have more reason than most to keep a low profile at present.

A few days ago a young Russian man, Grigori Perelman, was awarded a prize for solving one of mathematics’s most difficult problems. A few days ago a young Russian man, Grigori Perelman, was awarded a prize for solving one of mathematics’s most difficult problems. It was an extraordinary achievement. The Poincaré conjecture (a topological conundrum) had baffled the best minds on the planet for over 100 years and the solution could help us understand the shape of the universe. Yet Perelman avoided any fanfare and, to the great surprise of the maths community, simply posted his solution online. Almost more extraordinary (for non-mathematicians) than Perelman’s proof was the fact that on Monday he turned down the prize money of a million dollars.

The brutal assassination of the US government workers Lesley Enriquez and Arthur Redelfs, carried out by gangsters linked to the Juarez drugs cartel last week, is reported to have been a retaliatory exercise following the recent extradition of several Mexican drugs lords to the States. It was another reminder that the US-led ‘war on drugs’ is lost. It is unwinnable, and merely serves to illustrate the folly of pursuing agendas for the sake of soundbites. Both America and Britain must accept that the international narcotics supply chain cannot be broken. Governments may not like it, but they must instead look to the users on their own streets. Wherever there is hopelessness, unemployment and poverty, demand will be highest.

The most distressing news of the week may be the suggestion that the world’s most entertaining love affair — between Nicolas Sarkozy and his First Lady, Carla Bruni — is drawing to a close. The most distressing news of the week may be the suggestion that the world’s most entertaining love affair — between Nicolas Sarkozy and his First Lady, Carla Bruni — is drawing to a close. The rumours began on Twitter, where they could be easily ignored, but now Le Journal du Dimanche has confirmed what it calls the story of the year. The presidential marriage is ‘breathing its last breaths’, it says. Perhaps it was optimistic to hope that such a gripping union could last.

Michael Foot, who died on Wednesday, aged 96, was a wonderful man. A major politician and an accomplished writer, he stood firmly in the great British tradition of literary radicals. There was something defiantly unmodern and unspun about him, but this was the point of Mr Foot: he was a leader who saw politics as a battle of ideas. The idea of spin was utterly alien to him. From his early days in journalism and the New Statesman, to Tribune magazine, which he edited after the war, to his last days, he maintained his intellectual integrity. This was what guided the radical Labour manifesto of 1983. It was, electorally, spectacularly unsuccessful. But it was, nonetheless, a work of immense honesty.

It is an odd day when Ed Balls is rebuked for pandering to the religious right. Yet that is exactly what happened this week, after the Secretary for Children, Schools and Families introduced an ‘opt-out’ clause in his new education bill which would allow religious schools to teach what they believe about sexual morality alongside the government curriculum. The Church of England, the Catholic Church, and the Muslim Council of Great Britain, grateful for any concession, have all welcomed the revised bill — even though it will still force Muslim teachers to instruct their pupils about homosexuality in a ‘non-judgmental’ way, and compel Christian schools to provide information on how children can gain ‘access’ to contraception and abortion.

Who can imagine the appalling strangeness of being ‘linked’ to the assassination of a man whom you have not heard of, in a country you have never visited, for reasons you do not understand? Perhaps Kafka. Who can imagine the appalling strangeness of being ‘linked’ to the assassination of a man whom you have not heard of, in a country you have never visited, for reasons you do not understand? Perhaps Kafka. Certainly Michael Lawrence Barney, a recovering quadruple-bypass patient who returned from work to find his children staring at the newspaper, wondering if their father was a terrorist. Melvyn Adam Mildiner must know the feeling, too. He was suffering from pneumonia when he discovered that Interpol had issued a warrant for his arrest.