The Spectator

Thursday

The Spectator

Barometer | 16 April 2015

From our UK edition

Out of tune The use of a song, ‘Love Natural’ by the Crystal Fighters, at the launch of the Labour manifesto backfired when the band’s drummer urged people to vote Green instead. Some other campaign songs whose writers disowned the campaign: — Ronald Reagan used ‘Born in the USA’ by Bruce Springsteen for his re-election campaign against Springsteen’s wishes. — In 2008, Barack Obama was asked to stop using ‘Soul Man’ by Sam Moore. — In the same year Jackson Browne sued the Ohio Republican party for using his ‘Running on Empty’ for John McCain’s election campaign.

The Spectator

A deadly silence

From our UK edition

One Friday, 28 people were rescued by the Italian coastguard when the boat on which they were fleeing Libya capsized in the Mediterranean. Arriving homeless and without prospects in a strange land, these were — relatively speaking — the lucky ones. As many as 700 are thought to have drowned. Add them to the tally. On Monday, another boat capsized with 400 souls feared lost. Last year more than 3,000 died in the Mediterranean trying to get to the West. It has become a phenomenon of our times. We do not hear much about life in the supposedly liberated Libya, but the fact that even immigrants into Libya would rather risk death than stay there gives a fair idea.

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The Spectator at war: Fortress Germany

From our UK edition

From ‘How it looks to a German’, The Spectator, 17 April 1915: Try to imagine how things must look to a German who dares to put off the mask of self-complacency which the German people have deliberately worn ever since the beginning of the war and to face the facts, the whole facts, and nothing but the facts. Surely no nation in history ever had a more gloomy, nay, a more terrifying, prospect in front of them in spite of one or two apparent advantages. It is true that there is little or no fighting going on upon German soil, for the woes of Austria-Hungary in this respect do not count. It is true, also, that the Germans have still a great superiority in equipment, especially in ammunition, explosives, guns, and rifles.

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Am I still an Englishman?

From our UK edition

From ‘Some reflections of an alien enemy: the contradiction between being and feeling an Englishman, by a Czech’, The Spectator, 17 April 1915: What I most regret having lost is my previous unawareness of there being any difference between me and Englishmen. In saying we, I used to mean we English people; somehow or other I find myself now compelled to distinguish between me, a foreigner, and you, English people. Quite proper that it should be so; yet at the same time I feel as though I had lost my birthright. The disappearance of my instinctive sense of identity with my fellow-men, quite irrespective of their nationality, fills me with sadness. An invisible, yet for all that quite tangible, barrier seems to have arisen around me.

Wednesday

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The Spectator at war: Germany’s unimpressive air raids

From our UK edition

From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 17 April 1915: The chief event, or rather sensation, of the week has been the German aircraft raids—first on the Tyne on Wednesday, and then on Thursday over Lowestoft and Malden and other parts of South Suffolk and North Essex. Both raids were quite futile. The raid on the Tyne caused no lose of life and very little destruction of property, and yet nearly thirty bombs were dropped I The accounts of the second raid are very meagre, but apparently the results were equally poor. In the case of the Tyne the small amount of damage was no doubt due to the fact that the moment the presence of the airship was reported all lights were extinguished and all tramcars and trains stood fast. Hence the pilot was unable to find his way.

Tuesday

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View from 22 podcast special: the Conservative manifesto

From our UK edition

In a View from 22 podcast special, Fraser Nelson, James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman discuss the implications of the Conservative manifesto, which was announced today. You can read the full manifesto here and Isabel's snap reaction here. Will Tory promises on issues such as childcare, housing and income tax be enough to convince voters that they are still better off under a Conservative government? Is Cameron adopting a more hardline approach when it comes to Islamic State? And is it now time for Cameron to take to the streets to meet the real people of Britain? As Isabel says, it feels a lot like Ed Miliband is more eager to win this election right now.

Saturday

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The Spectator at war: Friendship and the war

From our UK edition

From ‘Friendship and the War’, The Spectator, 10 April 1915: WE are all losing our friends. This is true in a tragic sense, because our friends are dying in battle. But there is a lighter sense in which it is true also, and which is also connected with the war. There is so much work to be done that there seems to be no time for keeping up with old friends, let alone for making new ones. Besides being busy, everybody is obsessed by new emotions, and cannot pay attention; and besides that, the mental strain of eight months' war is beginning to tell, and we are all rather on edge. Anyhow, there is everywhere a cessation of ordinary social life. We do not meet our neighbours unless we come across them in the way of business.

Friday

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The Spectator at war: The possibilities of thrift

From our UK edition

From ‘The Possibilities of Thrift’, The Spectator, 10 April 1915: IT has, perhaps, not yet been sufficiently realized that the country is passing through what may almost be called an economic revolution. Large numbers of the working classes who, let it be frankly admitted, were often underpaid are now in receipt of incomes which, in comparison with their previous earnings, must almost be described as princely. The husband, who by the nature of the case in a working-class family is the greatest consumer, has gone to the front, and the wife finds herself in possession of a larger income than before, while she is relieved of the principal burden upon her housekeeping money.

Thursday