James Delingpole

The big question this week is: ‘Should Giles Coren be bound, gagged, shackled and sentenced to life imprisonment in the torture block of the sexual offenders’ wing of Black Beach maximum security prison in Equatorial Guinea, there to become the plaything of Mad “Mamba” Mbigawanga, the Man-Rapist Giant of Malabo?’ Well, obviously, when you put it like that, the answer’s obvious. The big question this week is: ‘Should Giles Coren be bound, gagged, shackled and sentenced to life imprisonment in the torture block of the sexual offenders’ wing of Black Beach maximum security prison in Equatorial Guinea, there to become the plaything of Mad “Mamba” Mbigawanga, the Man-Rapist Giant of Malabo?

I’m in Dallas, Texas, for a Heritage Foundation conference when who should march into my hotel but a battalion of US marines, ahead of their deployment to Afghanistan. I’m in Dallas, Texas, for a Heritage Foundation conference when who should march into my hotel but a battalion of US marines, ahead of their deployment to Afghanistan. I watch, agog. The marines all look desperately young, even the ones who’ve done several tours of duty. Interestingly, though they all must have bonded intensely in the field, off duty they still socialise by ethnic group — blacks with blacks, Hispanics with Hispanics, and so on. Later, I ambush a senior NCO and a rookie smoking in the garden. ‘Can I ask you a question?’ ‘Yes, sir!’ says the NCO.

One of the things I’ve belatedly realised now I’ve acquired the wisdom of age is that I’ve always been anti-establishment. One of the things I’ve belatedly realised now I’ve acquired the wisdom of age is that I’ve always been anti-establishment. If only I’d known this at school I would have had far more fun than I did because I wouldn’t have wasted any of my time trying to smarm and behave my way into pointless jobs like ‘library prefect’, ‘group leader’ and ‘head of house’. I could have got drunk and smoked fags and got to at least third base with the naughty girls, like all the cool kids did, instead. My problem was — and still is to some extent — that I am way, way too trusting and naive.

The Fawn came up to me the other day in a state of extreme agitation: she’d been listening to George Monbiot on the radio. The Fawn came up to me the other day in a state of extreme agitation: she’d been listening to George Monbiot on the radio. My ears pricked up. I do so love it when the Fawn gets cross about the same things as me. It makes me glad that I’m not married to one of those leftie wives — we all know the sort — who drag their more right-wing husbands down the siren path of bien-pensant foolishness. Monbiot had been on the Today programme with Tiff Needell, the likeable racing driver who used to co-present Top Gear.

‘Oh Daddy, please can I have that Nazi eagle badge. ‘Oh Daddy, please can I have that Nazi eagle badge. Oh please, oh please.’ We’re standing in the gift shop of the Baugnez ’44 memorial museum outside Malmedy, Belgium — me, Grandpa (aka my dad) and Girl — and we’re peering longingly into the original second world war memorabilia display case like Tiny Tims at Christmas. There are so many things we’d like if only we had the money: original GI helmets (€400 for a good one, with decent leather strap), packets of vintage Camels, tins of delousing powder, camouflage sticks, Wehrmacht pay books and, yes, Nazi eagle badges of all shapes and sizes. Inevitably, it’s the German stuff we covet most.

Just because you’re a hypochondriac doesn’t mean you’re not suffering from an obscure and terrible disease which is going to kill you very horribly. Just because you’re a hypochondriac doesn’t mean you’re not suffering from an obscure and terrible disease which is going to kill you very horribly. That’s why, high on the long list of osteopaths, chiropractors, acupuncturists and other alternative practitioners I spend fortunes on every year, is a miracle worker called Fiona Gross. In another age, Fiona would surely have been burned as a witch: the things she does with her array of potions baint natural. Just recently, for example, she cured a woman (a successful author) of a mysterious respiratory illness acquired on holiday in Greece.

‘Have you heard about the vast Libertarian conspiracy? We’re going to take over the government — and then leave you alone!’ This is the kind of joke that makes me proud to be libertarian, as a lot of the wisest, funniest and best people are these days, from Kelsey Grammer to Clint Eastwood to Trey Parker from South Park. ‘Have you heard about the vast Libertarian conspiracy? We’re going to take over the government — and then leave you alone!’ This is the kind of joke that makes me proud to be libertarian, as a lot of the wisest, funniest and best people are these days, from Kelsey Grammer to Clint Eastwood to Trey Parker from South Park.

Q. Why did God give liberals annoying, whiny voices? A. So that even the blind could hate them. Q. Why did God give liberals annoying, whiny voices? A. So that even the blind could hate them. This is probably my favourite joke from a new book I just published in the US, (hence the use of ‘liberal’ in its American sense), called 365 Ways To Drive A Liberal Crazy. Though I don’t think it’s quite as funny as the Obama ‘Men Who Stare At Goats’ joke or the one about Nancy Pelosi and the sheep on the desert island, I like it a) because I invented it (or, rather, adapted it from an old Eighties racist joke) and b) because it offends so many liberal pieties.