The Spectator

Thursday

The Spectator

Peter Oborne: Ed Miliband is the most accomplished opposition leader since the war

From our UK edition

[audioplayer src="http://traffic.libsyn.com/spectator/TheViewFrom22_12_Feb_2015_v4.mp3" title="Peter Oborne and Dan Hodges discuss Ed Miliband" startat=1343] In this week’s Spectator podcast, we put a Labour and a Tory supporter next to each other to debate the virtues of Ed Miliband. The difference being that Peter Oborne is a passionate defender of the leader, and Dan Hodges his most vocal critic. Peter explains to Sebastian Payne that while he is a conservative journalist, his job is to tell the truth, and put political prejudices to one side, which leads him to conclude that Ed Miliband is a man of incredible accomplishment and bravery, whose efficacy is demonstrated by the ferocity of the press backlash against him.

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: Military timetables | 12 February 2015

From our UK edition

From ‘The New “Day” and Merchant Shipping’, The Spectator, 13 February 1915: THE Germans have such a mania for fixing a day for achieving some important purpose that we should feel guilty of a certain want of responsiveness if we grudged them anything of the pleasure they are deriving from contemplating the mystical date of February 18th. This is the new “day” on which the terrific process of starving Britain out by means of a few submarines is formally to begin. So be it it! The greatest day of all—Der Tag—was a kind of idealistic conception projected upon the screen of the future, like Messianic prophetic poetry.

The Spectator

From the archives | 12 February 2015

From our UK edition

From ‘Prohibition in Scotland during the War’, The Spectator, 13 February 1915: At present the economic waste caused by drunkenness in Scotland is enormous. We are not going to attempt to calculate how many hours in the working year are lost through the inefficiency caused by alcohol, but unquestionably in the aggregate the total is huge… even if when the war is over Scotland gives up prohibition and once more flings open the doors of the public-house, she will have done herself a great deal of good by the temporary prohibition. Thousands of men and women throughout the length and breadth of the land will have realised how perfectly easy it is to get on without the consumption of alcohol.

Wednesday

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: Needling pain

From our UK edition

From ‘Compulsory Inoculation’, The Spectator, 13 February 1915: IT is a little difficult to keep one's patience with the Government's attitude towards compulsory inoculation. It is a capital example of “Letting ‘I dare not’ wait up ‘I would,’ like the poor cat i' the adage.” “The cat would eat fish, and would not wet her feet.” The Government would like to knock enteric out altogether from the list of serious Army diseases. They know that they can do so and ought to do so, but they have not done so as yet because they do not want to wet their feet politically—i.e., antagonize the faddists of their party.

Tuesday

Monday

The Spectator

The Spectator at war: A dreadful froth of dead

From our UK edition

From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 13 February 1915: FROM the eastern theatre of war there have been received daring the week details of the gigantic dimensions of Field-Marshal von Hindenburg's grand attack upon the Russian centre—i.e., upon the force on the Bzura which bars the German advance on Warsaw. On a very narrow front, not more, it is said, than seven miles, the Germans concentrated some hundred and fifty thousand of their best troops and burled them in close formation, five deep, upon the Russian trenches. This mighty mass of battalions, brigades, and divisions was supported by the fire of no fewer than a hundred batteries, or six hundred guns. The gun and rifle fire of the Russians swept away the beads of the formations as they advanced.

Sunday

The Spectator

Removing Tony Abbott as Australian Prime Minister is pointless and reckless

From our UK edition

In the latest issue of Spectator Australia, the leading article lambasts the Australian Liberal Party for trying to remove Prime Minister Tony Abbott: The determination by many in the media, even among conservatives, to hasten the demise of Tony Abbott’s prime ministership is as pointless as it is reckless. Pointless not because they will or they won’t succeed, but pointless because such an outcome would merely herald the beginning, rather than the end, of a long period of Coalition instability and in-fighting. Make no mistake: it is not Tony Abbott the man who is deeply unpopular (although his poll figures are, at present, nothing to write home about).

Thursday