Iraq

[audioplayer src=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/spectator/TheViewFrom22_9_Oct_2014_v4.mp3″ title=”Justin Marozzi and Caroline Kisko, Kennel Club Secretary, discuss vicious dogs” startat=1287] Listen [/audioplayer]It happened so quickly, as these things always do. My wife Julia and I were pootling about on Wells beach with our fluffy mongrel Maisie when suddenly two fighting dogs, English bull terriers, came flying towards us like calf-high missiles. Declining the usual canine politesse of a bit of bum-sniffing, one immediately locked its jaws around Maisie’s throat, the other clamped its teeth into her right back leg. They then tossed her around like a rag doll, as my wife and I desperately tried to haul them off. Maisie was howling in terrible distress. She

Home The Commons, having been specially recalled, passed, by 524 votes to 43, a motion supporting ‘the use of UK air strikes to support Iraqi, including Kurdish, security forces’ efforts against Isil in Iraq’. Only after four days did RAF Tornados from Akrotiri in Cyprus find some targets in Iraq to bomb. In support of her contention that Isil’s ‘hateful ideology has nothing to do with Islam’, Theresa May, the Home Secretary, in a well-received speech at the Conservative party conference, quoted the Qu’ran: ‘Let there be no compulsion in religion’ (Sura 2:256). A poster intended for staff was put up by mistake in the window of a Sainsbury’s in

Home England suddenly began to take the prospect of Scottish independence seriously after a poll of 1,084 people by YouGov put support for it at 51 per cent and opposition at 49 per cent. A survey by TNS showed 38 per cent of Scots backed independence compared to 39 per cent opposing it (with 23 per cent not knowing). The pound fell to its lowest for ten months against the dollar. George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in concert with Labour and the Liberal Democrats, promised a timetable for further devolution if voters in Scotland would only reject independence. The Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition agreed

Home Britain’s terror threat level was raised from ‘substantial’ to ‘severe’ in response to fighting in Iraq and Syria, meaning that an attack on Britain was ‘highly likely’. Three days later, David Cameron, the Prime Minister, in a hesitant statement to the Commons, proposed that: police should be able to seize temporarily at the border the passports of people travelling overseas; there should be all-party talks on drawing up powers to prevent suspected British terrorists returning to Britain; those under terrorism prevention and investigation measures (Tpims) should be subject to ‘stronger locational constraints’. The Celtic Manor Resort (rooms from £77), near Junction 24 on the M4 outside Newport, prepared to accommodate