From our UK edition
So Gordon Brown, having brought forward his trip to Iraq, says that more than 1,000 troops will be home by Christmas. Is this the same Gordon Brown who said at Camp David that no announcement on troop drawdown would be made until he delivered his Commons statement, set for next week? What encouraged the PM to break this promise and make the declaration now? Surely not the Tories' strong showing in Blackpool?
From our UK edition
Politicians like to talk about 'non-electoral milestones'—the big symbols, endorsements and Clause 4 moments that pave the way for a party's return to power. But what about the much smaller signs—let's call them 'micro-runes' –that might or might not reflect political recovery? Here are three: 1. The Sun is depicting David Cameron this week as a Tom Cruise-style agent on a Mission Impossible - thus making glamorous his apparently insuperable task. Remember: this is the newspaper that pictured Neil Kinnock with his head inside a lightbulb, inviting the last person to leave Britain to turn the lights out, and William Hague as a dead parrot. 2. Labour ministers long ago realised the importance of the GMTV sofa, and the value of a positive aside by one of its presenters.
From our UK edition
Fans of Larry David's deeply wonderful US comedy series Curb Your Enthusiasm will be familiar with the social angst of the "Stop-and-Chat". This is Larry's description of the social obligation to stop walking where you're going and to talk to anyone you happen to bump into whom you know. Larry hates the duty to "Stop-and-Chat". Sociopathic? Yes, but a straw poll of delegates in Blackpool suggests to me that most of them secretly agree with him when it comes to party conferences. "I hide in my room sometimes," one Tory told me, "because I just can't bear having to have the same ten minute conversation with people I haven't seen since last conference and then promising them all lunch to make them go away.
From our UK edition
The psychology of this conference is like no other I've experienced. Having mastered walking, the Cameron Conservative Party believed it had a couple of years in which to get on top of this running business. No such luck. Gordon Brown's very public toying with a snap election has compelled the party to unveil a larger tranche of hard policies than it had hoped to do at this stage of the electoral cycle. So Michael Gove and George Osborne had to look this morning as if they were capable of being Schools Secretary and Chancellor respectively in a matter of days. It is to their immense credit that each (in my opinion) passed this test.
From our UK edition
There are certain gentleman's conventions that govern British politics. One is that party leaders do not trash each other while overseas. Another is that, while one of the main parties is holding its annual conference, the other more or less keeps quiet: why, after all, waste a good policy proposal when the political press pack is filing thousands of words about the other lot from a seaside resort? But, in the next election - whenever it comes - Marquess of Queensberry rules will definitely not be observed. Just as Gordon Brown did not deign to mention the Tories in his Bournemouth conference speech seven days ago, so his Government now plans to unveil an announcement a day during Mr Cameron's make-or-break week. This is about form not content.
From our UK edition
Where the Conservative Party goes, the spirit of enterprise follows. Resourcefully, the local cinema in Blackpool is showing a mini-season of Arnold Schwarzenegger blockbusters to compensate for the Governator's physical absence from this week's conference. Which means that delegates who can't face Dave's big speech on Wednesday can enjoy Terminator 3 instead. One will be an all-action thriller with lots of stunts and special effects in which a battered cybernetic organism repeatedly defies death against an apparently unbeatable foe in an attempt to prevent catastrophe; and the other will be an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie.
From our UK edition
Amid all the polls, hoopla and election prognostications as the Tories gather in Blackpool, don't miss this interview in today's Sindy with Sayeeda Warsi, the shadow minister for social cohesion. She speaks about the incapacity of modern Government to cope with modern population mobility, a subject I also address in today's Sunday Telegraph. Much more contentiously she detects legitimacy in the grievances of some who vote for far Right parties. Were this warning uttered by a white male, it would cause the Tory walls to come tumbling down; as a free marketeer who has always defended immigration and the viability of multi-ethnic Britain, I must confess that her position makes me feel queasy and it certainly won't be welcomed by the Tory modernisers.
From our UK edition
The longing for the girl snapped in Morocco to be Madeleine McCann rippled round the world. This story has taken so many twists and turns, many of them savage, but it has always been underpinned by a hope, however remote, that the child may still be alive. So it is heart-breaking to learn that the pictured girl is, in fact, a blonde Berber called Bouchra Benaissa. One can only imagine the new misery suffered by the McCanns themselves as yet another dawn proved to be false. They must wonder each morning how many varieties of Hell are left for them to be put through.
From our UK edition
It was the Spec wot won it….well, not quite. But I like to think that our ferocious, implacable support for Boris played a small part in persuading London voters to choose him as their Tory mayoral candidate by an overwhelming margin (75 per cent of the 20,019 votes). Then again, what else were they going to do? My venerated predecessor as Editor is a giant of a politician, and his selection as the Conservative contender was – with the greatest respect to his rivals – never much in doubt. Here, at last, is a candidate who not only has the charisma and the policies to take on Ken and win. He has what it takes to wrest London from Labour’s hands and, in so doing, wipe the smile off the governing party’s collective face.
From our UK edition
The news that Ed Balls is to scrap the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority and replace it with an independent body prompts two thoughts. First, Mr Balls is showing real promise as the man in charge of the nation's schools, and will be kept on his toes by his splendid Tory Shadow, Michael Gove. This is an excellent measure, and one that might just save the debauched currency of public examinations from slipping into Weimar oblivion. Mr Balls was the co-author with Gordon Brown of the decision to hand control of interest rates to the Bank of England: he understands that trust follows when politicians step aside. Second, the proposal illustrates the injustice of Opposition politics.
From our UK edition
An interview with Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton’s chief strategist If Hillary Clinton is sworn in as 44th President of the United States in January 2009, the man sitting opposite me in the bar of the Dorchester will become one of the most powerful people in the world. Mark Penn, pollster extraordinaire, adviser to Tony Blair in the 2005 election, and legendary number-cruncher to Bill Clinton is now chief strategist to the Democrat frontrunner and, it is widely believed, Hillary’s alter ego, the man she calls at 7 a.m. wherever she is in the world. In her memoirs, she calls him ‘brilliant and intense’ and ‘shrewd and insightful’.
From our UK edition
The breaking news is that the BBC Blue Peter cat-naming scandal was even murkier than it first appeared. As the Beeb fessed up today, the true result of a viewer competition to choose the name of the cat - 'Cookie' was the people's choice - was over-ridden by heartless Corporation executives who imposed the name 'Socks' instead. There are now sensational allegations of electoral fraud, as the inevitable blame game begins. Apparently, there was a suspicious late surge of votes in favour of 'Cookie', leading the heirs to Reith to conclude that they must intervene - a dubious decision which has now backfired spectacularly. As any parent knows, you don't mess with children's choice of name for an animal. To adapt Quentin Tarantino on messing with another man's vehicle, You Just Don't Do It.
From our UK edition
What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. But not with Sir Elton John, who last week brought the Red Piano Show that has thrilled audiences at Caesar’s Palace for two years to London’s O2 Centre. While not yet etched in legend quite as deeply as Sinatra’s residency at the Sands, or Elvis’s performances at the Las Vegas Hilton, this was still pretty amazing stuff, not least because this particular knight was only performing on this particular night. Sir Elton has made a bit of a thing in recent years of going ‘back to basics’, especially with his excellent 2001 album, Songs from the West Coast, which pared down to its essentials the style he has developed with his lyricist Bernie Taupin since their first recording, ‘Scarecrow’, in 1967.
From our UK edition
The Spectator’s new partnership with the debating forum Civilised debate is the essence of The Spectator: it is what animated ‘the little Committee of Politicks’ that Joseph Addison encountered in the St James’s Coffee-house and described in the magazine in March 1711. Three centuries on, it is the desire for a cheerful rhetorical punch-up, in print or in person, that still excites us most at 22 Old Queen Street. Rod Liddle, Jeremy Clarke, Deborah Ross, Taki, Fraser Nelson: these are only some of the verbal pugilists who form the ‘little Committee’ in our own happy, cacophonous republic of letters.
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As a Northern Rock mortgage holder, I naturally went to the bank’s website when I heard the news about the Bank of England’s extraordinary intervention, providing emergency funding for the troubled lender. There, I was sure, I would find a reassuring Q&A for customers, explaining – or trying to explain – why there was nothing for us to worry about. But not a bit of it. Instead, a big, jolly picture of a frog’s eyes and the headline: “Looking for a Loan? You’ve got it with a low rate unsecured loan.” Guys, I don’t mean to be picky, but don’t you think this might be a good day to refresh the home page?
From our UK edition
Take a look at the Guardian's report this morning on a new study by the International Institute for Strategic Studies on the current strength of al Qaeda. So much energy has been expended on denying the very existence of a war on terror and, in recent days, on attacking Petraeus - all you need to know on that subject, by the way, is in James's piece in the new Spectator - that the global status of bin Laden's terror network has tended to be neglected. So it is both important and chilling to read the finding of the IISS, "that 'core' al-Qaida is proving adaptable and resilient, and has retained an ability to plan and coordinate large-scale attacks in the western world despite the attrition it has suffered...
From our UK edition
Imagine actually meeting Thomas Edison, or the Wright Brothers, or Newton, or Archimedes, or whichever Sumerian it was who invented the wheel in the fifth millennium bc. That, when you think about it, is what it’s like to have a conversation with Vint Cerf. Few people in the history of humanity can say with confidence that they invented or discovered something that has changed the trajectory of the species, but this genial Connecticut-born 64-year-old is among their number. Cerf is none other than the joint Father of the Internet (Robert E. Kahn being the other proud parent), which means that if you are reading this article on the Spectator website, or plan to send any emails today, or expect to use Google, or order a book on Amazon, you are doing so thanks to him.
From our UK edition
I have a piece in today's Independent on the downfall of Amy Winehouse, an extended version of my post earlier this week. Which just goes to show that where Coffee House leads, the press follows.
From our UK edition
Tomorrow’s editorial in The Spectator praises David Cameron for taking on board one of the many lessons to be learned from the his old boss at the Home Office, Michael Howard: prison works. One of the other conclusions that Mr Howard reached during his remarkable spell as Home Secretary – during which crime fell by 18 per cent – was that the prison system itself needed a radical overhaul. Part of that would involve ending the vice-like grip of the Prison Officers’ Association upon our jails, its Spanish practices and Jurassic approach to pay and conditions. One solution was the contracting out of prison management to the private sector – rather lazily described as “privatisation” – a project that never truly got off the ground.
From our UK edition
If you didn't hear it, don't miss John Humphrys interviewing Jeremy Paxman on this morning's Today programme (you can hear it online). Paxman has issued a resounding critique of British broadcasting generally and the BBC specifically which will - given the power of his brand - probably have more impact than any attack on the Corporation since Dennis Potter called John Birt a "croak-voiced Dalek". Paxman wants television and radio to define "a clear sense of purpose", an ethical mission beyond the imperatives of business, and he sounded, as you would expect, very plausible. Yet the appeal, frankly, of this exchange had nothing to do with the content and everything to do with the identity of the protagonists. Humphrys versus Paxman!