James Forsyth is former political editor of The Spectator.
From our UK edition
Bagehot, The Economist’s political columnist, has started a blog which promises to be well worth reading. In one of his early entries, Bagehot wonders about the effect of the recession on non-economic areas of policy and life. It seems almost inevitable that the lack of money and the mounting public debt are going to lead
From our UK edition
It is an achievement for Gordon Brown to be the first European leader to visit the Obama White House. The invitation to the Prime Minister to address a joint session of Congress next week is also impressive. One imagines that these scenes of Brown on the world stage will, at least temporarily, help his ratings
From our UK edition
The editorial page of The Wall Street Journal Europe rips into the Asset Protection Scheme the government announced yesterday: “It’s little surprise that U.K. financials rallied yesterday on the news that the British state will guarantee more than £500 billion of the banks’ toxic assets. It’s like getting car insurance after having crashed the vehicle
From our UK edition
Fraser’s piece in the magazine this week on how California is inspiring the Tories is well worth reading. Fraser makes the point that the Tories are attracted to California because family friendly policies and dynamic businesses go together there. The important thing to appreciate is that these businesses are family friendly not because of regulation
From our UK edition
The Standards and Privileges Committee has now reported on the complaint against Gordon Brown and it has concluded that Brown did breach the rules, albeit inadvertently: “We conclude that Mr Brown should not have sub-let part of his accommodation paid for from Parliamentary allowances. However, neither Mr Brown nor the Labour Party derived any financial
From our UK edition
Coalition negotiations are ongoing in Israel and so you’d expect them to be the main story for the media there. But every time I go to Haaretz’s site or that of the Jerusalem Post, the top story is about Iran and its nuclear programme. Israel is acutely aware of the threat it faces. The more
From our UK edition
Bobby Jindal’s response to Barack Obama’s speech last night flopped. In terms of content it fell back far too often on simplistic anti-government platitudes and did not offer anywhere near enough of an alternative vision for how to chart a course out of this crisis. But the content was not its biggest problem, the delivery
From our UK edition
The speeches by Gordon Brown, William Hague and Vince Cable in the Commons just now were moving proof that there are times when Westminster can set party politics to one side. Watching it one couldn’t help but reflect on how many of our national leaders’ lives have been touched by tragedy. Brown and Cameron have
From our UK edition
Today’s splash in The Independent about British citizens attacking the British military in Afghanistan is yet another reminder of the challenges we as a county face from Islamic extremism. The fact that these people choose to fight with the Taliban, proponents of the most repressive form of Islam, against the military of their liberal democratic
From our UK edition
Last week I noted that if Labour returned to opposition, the Parliamentary Labour Party would elect the shadow Cabinet. Politics Home has now asked their panel of Westminster experts who they think will be voted in–and out–by the PLP. The results, which they’ve kindly advanced to me, make for interesting reading. The majority of the
From our UK edition
Tonight President Obama addresses a join session of Congress in a televised, prime-time address. It will be in style, if not title, just like a State of the Union speech. So expect special guests—notably Captain Sullenberger who landed that plane in the Hudson, lots of glad-handing as Obama walks to the Speaker’s chair and wave
From our UK edition
I must admit to being rather fascinated by the details about the lives of the fraudsters who are being caught out now that the financial tide has gone out. New York Magazine has a set of pieces on Bernie Madoff this week that not only suggest he was slightly relieved to be caught—when the FBI
From our UK edition
Today’s Guardian poll suggesting Labour would do better with someone other than Gordon at the helm is another blow to Brown. Realistically I can’t see Brown being replaced as Labour leader before the next election, there’s no stomach for the bloody struggle that it would take to prise Brown out of Downing Street and it
From our UK edition
Tomorrow night, Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana, will give the Republican response to Barack Obama’s televised speech to a joint session of Congress. Jindal is the rising star of the Republican party. Only 37, Jindal is the governor of Louisiana having already been a Congressman and an assistant secretary at Health and Human Services
From our UK edition
Ever since Gordon Brown became Prime Minister and Ed Balls Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, there has been a steady attempt to undermine the academies programme. Brown and Balls have set about rolling back the freedoms that the academies had been given and quietly bringing them back under the dead hand of
From our UK edition
There’s much I disagree with in Ken Macdonald’s piece in The Times today but he is right that the authorities’ attitude to corporate crime is disgracefully lax. As Macdonald writes: “In Britain, no one has any confidence that fraud in the banks will be prosecuted as crime. But it is absolutely critical to public confidence
From our UK edition
As Martin says, the divide in the government right now is whether the right legislative response to the recession is to–in political shorthand– ‘ease the burdens on business’ or ‘protect workers more’. Today’s splash in The Times about Peter Mandelson’s plan to postpone the plans for more generous maternity leave and tougher equalities legislation which Harriet
From our UK edition
The Obama campaign was a no-drama operation. Partly this was a matter of the candidate’s temperament but it was also to create a contrast first with the drama-filled Clinton campaign that suffered from a surfeit of egos and then with the McCain campaign whose principal seemed, at times, to be almost addicted to the dramatic gesture.
From our UK edition
Read pretty much any Sunday newspaper today and you’ll come across stories of politicians making expenses claim that, to put it mildly, stretch the spirit of the regulations. The Jacqui Smith story has prompted the press to go digging and they have come up with a lot of stuff. The MPs involved are not all
From our UK edition
Ken Clarke’s interview with Patrick Hennessy of The Sunday Telegraph is notable both for Clarke’s continuing message discipline and for his hint that the Tories are moving towards favouring a ‘bad bank’. When pressed on what he would do if David Cameron did call a referendum on Lisbon with the Tories calling for a no