The Spectator

Wednesday

Julie Lumsden

Wonderful Tennessee

Distillation of a play by Brian Friel, first performed at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, on 30 June 1993 Silence. Sound – waves tumbling over each other, seagull, singing, laughing, as three couples run onto the beach. They are celebrating the birthday of Terry. Angela and Berna are sisters. Angela and George are having a secret affair. Frank hopes to stay off the booze. Trish never stops dancing. Halfway into the Second Act – Terry declares his medical condition and expectation of demise.  Six monologues. Then they make a promise. A year from now they will return for another celebration, all of them, Terry will be with them, Terry will always be with them. Laughing, singing, they leave human litter on the beach. Silence.

Monday

The Spectator

House GOP declares border bill ‘DEAD on arrival’

From our US edition

After a long wait, the text of the bipartisan Senate bill for Ukraine and border funding was finally released on Sunday night. The massive piece of legislation clocks in at 370 pages and, in addition to the border policy changes previously reported on here, sends an additional $60 billion to Ukraine, tightens asylum standards, prohibits removal of unaccompanied minors, authorizes $1.4 billion in FEMA funding for resources for migrants settling in the US and gives President Biden the authority to overturn any emergency authorization at the border. The House GOP’s verdict is in: Speaker Johnson asserted that the legislation is “dead on arrival” in his chamber.  “I’ve seen enough.

Friday

The Spectator

US launches retaliatory air strikes in Iraq and Syria

From our US edition

The US is currently launching retaliatory air strikes in Iraq and Syria, the Pentagon confirmed this afternoon.  The strikes come after three American servicemembers were killed in a drone strike by an Iranian-backed militia on Sunday, with dozens more wounded. Top Biden administration officials had said “it will pretty be clear” when the American response begins. “The first thing you see won’t be the last,” National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told the media Wednesday. -Matt McDonald Soros staffers unionize — and immediately get laid off This month’s better-than-expected jobs numbers are cold comfort to employees of a George Soros-funded group that recruits young Democrats to run for office.

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters: is the Scottish ‘McMafia’ model still better than Westminster?

Scot free Sir: In last week’s piece on the SNP, Fraser Nelson was critical of the Covid scenario in which ‘civil servants were enlisted in the SNP secret state’ (‘The Covid clan’, 27 January). Fraser makes comparisons with Whitehall but fails to ask the obvious question: is the Scottish model preferable, where the civil service and state media join a ‘mafia’ run by elected politicians? Or is Westminster governance since 2010 better, where the elected government pontificates and the civil service, quangocracy and state media continue to do what they like? Now Nicola Sturgeon has time on her hands, perhaps she can hire herself out as a consultant to Rishi Sunak on the subject of Taking Back Control.

The Spectator

Which ministers have complained publicly about their own poverty?

On their uppers The former science minister George Freeman claimed that he resigned from the government last year because he couldn’t afford his mortgage repayments – which had risen from £800 to £2,000 a month – on his ministerial salary of £118,000. – There is a precedent for a minister complaining publicly about his own poverty. In September 1985 the arts minister Grey Gowrie (who was a member of the cabinet under the auspices of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster) resigned from the job complaining that his £33,000 salary was ‘not what people need for living in central London’. He was subsequently appointed chairman of Sotheby’s on a salary reputed to be £150,000.

The Spectator

2636: Happy Ever After – solution

The twelve unclued lights form three quartets, each of which comprises two words that follow and two which precede one of the three words of the puzzle’s title: HAPPY [TRIGGER, WALKING, MEDIUM and ENDING]; EVER [HARDLY, CANTIL (thus reading ‘cantilever’), SINCE and GREEN]; and AFTER [SHAVE and TASTE, LOOK and TAKE].

The Spectator

Who’s afraid of population growth?

In ten years’ time, there’s a good chance that the main concern in the western world will be the threat of population collapse. Fertility rates are falling everywhere and no government has found a way of reversing the trend. Plenty have tried. South Korea has so far spent $200 billion on tax breaks and lowering childcare costs and has succeeded only in beating its own record for the world’s lowest birth rate, year after year. In Italy, the situation is close to a crisis, and in France it’s not much better. If this continues, the welfare state model, which depends on a decent worker-to-pensioner ratio, will collapse. There will not be enough tax revenue to finance pensions.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: vapes banned, Sunak fasts and royals leave hospital

Home Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton, the Foreign Secretary, set off on his fourth visit to the Middle East after saying: ‘We – with allies – will look at the issue of recognising a Palestinian state, including at the United Nations.’ The Democratic Unionist party agreed to return to the power-sharing government in Northern Ireland, in return for a change in the law surrounding the Windsor Framework post-Brexit agreement with the European Union. Separately, from the end of January veterinary certificates were legally required for fresh food and plant imports from the EU to England. The population of the United Kingdom would reach 70 million by 2026, the Office for National Statistics forecast, and by 2036 would reach 73.7 million, after 7.

Wednesday

The Spectator

Carjacking spirals out of control in the capital

From our US edition

A former Trump official is reportedly in critical condition after being shot during an attempted carjacking in Washington on Monday evening. Mike Gill was waiting to pick up his wife when a man shot him and then fled on foot. The carjacker allegedly went on a rampage, killing Alberto Vasquez Jr. after taking his car keys, stealing two more cars and then firing a gun at a police officer before he was finally shot and killed.Carjackings have become a serious problem around the country, but especially in the nation’s capital. Last year, carjackings doubled, reaching a shocking 959 reported incidents. Public officials have said that most of the carjackings in DC are committed by repeat teenage offenders.

Julian Stannard

The Pool

The chief leaf man rises early. A breeze in the banyan tree. The water laps. Skink lizard on the prowl. Perfection. Blue. Perfection. No leaves on the water. Miles Davis –his ghost – becoming the banyan tree. Chief leaf man sees a leaf in the corner of the pool and shouts in Vietnamese. Leaf man number two crouches,  picks it out. The apprentice leaf boy, conical hat, takes a broom from the storeroom. Sweeps. The hotel dog –a Saigon mongrel – watches. Eternal – mythological – war of leaves. The frangipani quickens. I watch its petals drop upon the water. A stiffening breeze from Saigon River. The palm trees writhe and thrash.

Monday

The Spectator

Senator Lankford defends his immigration deal

From our US edition

Senate Republicans who are negotiating an immigration reform bill with Democrats are defending their efforts after conservatives reacted angrily to leaked details for the deal. The lead negotiator, Senator James Lankford, said on Fox News Sunday that his detractors are relying on “internet rumors” to fuel their opposition to the bill.“This bill focuses on getting us to zero illegal crossings a day,” Lankford said. “There’s no amnesty, it increases the number of border patrol agents, it increases asylum officers, it increases detention beds so we can quickly detain and then deport individuals.

james lankford

Friday

The Spectator

Is the RNC about to back Trump?

From our US edition

A new report from the Dispatch claimed that David Bossie, a Republican National Committee member and former advisor to the Trump campaign, had drafted a resolution that would effectively end the primary and put the RNC symbolically behind former president Donald Trump. The draft resolution was immediately met with concerns that only two states had voted in the GOP primary and that the RNC should preside over a fair process, although it would not have ended the primary nor changed how state parties ran their elections.

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters: Jesus was a wine connoisseur 

Benefits of abstinence Sir: In last week’s Spectator, I turned to the cover piece ‘Dry Britain’ first because I stopped drinking alcohol last January. However, contrary to the demographic expectations of your article, I am a not-young 58-year-old. My abstinence is not based on a moral position, nor fear of an appearance on TikTok, but on the fact that three people I knew of my age and younger sadly passed away in the past year. One was directly due to the effects of alcohol, and in the other two cases alcohol was a likely factor. A year ago I was relatively fit, healthy and slim in comparison to the majority of my peers but still, as I peered at the horizon, I could make out a grim-looking gent with a scythe.

The Spectator

Could Nikki Haley become the first female US president? 

Madame president If Donald Trump stumbles before election day, could Nikki Haley end up becoming the first female US president? Hillary Clinton failed as the first female presidential candidate in 2016, but she wasn’t the first to stand on a presidential ticket: that honour belongs to the now-forgotten Geraldine A. Ferraro, who was picked by Walter Mondale to be his Democratic running mate in the 1984 election. Mondale had hoped to win over women voters, but his tactic appeared to backfire when a poll soon after her selection showed only 22 per cent of women voters approved of Mondale’s choice and three in five of all voters believed he had only chosen Ferraro to please feminist groups, not for her innate abilities.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Sturgeon’s missing WhatsApps and Trump’s latest victory 

Home Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, told the House of Commons that, in taking part in a second American air attack on Houthi positions near Sanaa, Britain had ‘acted in line with international law, in self defence, and in response to an immediate threat’. This time the leader of the opposition had not been informed before the attack. Sir Keir Starmer, the Labour leader, said: ‘We back this targeted action.’ Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton, the Foreign Secretary, set off to visit the Middle East. The Commons Procedure Committee decided to recommend that the Foreign Secretary should in general answer questions in the Commons by being summoned to the Bar of the House.

The Spectator

Why won’t Europe defend its own interests?

The US and Britain have joined forces to strike Houthi rebels who have been attacking commercial shipping in the Red Sea. But where is the rest of Europe when it comes to defending its own interests? The Netherlands has provided some logistic support – along with Australia, Bahrain and Canada – but European countries have otherwise opted out of the operation, just as they have so many times before. The attacks on shipping cannot be allowed to persist, and the operation to prevent them must continue This response to the Houthi attacks is no military adventure. It does not compare with the invasion of Iraq 21 years ago, which raised legitimate questions about the legality and wisdom of trying to invade, seize and rebuild a country.

Wednesday

The Spectator

Trump’s giant leap toward the GOP nomination

From our US edition

Last night, former president Donald Trump all but sewed up the Republican nomination for president in 2024. Former UN ambassador and South Carolina governor Nikki Haley finished eleven points behind Trump in a state that she needed to win in order to justify her continued presence in the race. Next up is Nevada, where Haley is not participating in the state GOP’s caucuses, as she has instead chosen to be listed on the irrelevant primary ballot. Then, Trump and Haley will square off in the latter’s home state of South Carolina. Trump enjoys a hefty lead there according to early polling, and Haley will be hard-pressed to improve her position with another $31 million of ad buys like she did in New Hampshire, as she is already a known quantity to voters there.

Trump

Monday

The Spectator

On the ground at the New Hampshire primary

From our US edition

New Hampshire votes tomorrow in the 2024 presidential primaries — and it seems no one is expecting an upset. The Spectator team dispatched to Manchester and has observed a significantly quieter scene than that of the 2020 Democratic primary contest. News coverage is scanter than expected, the bars and restaurants are empty and there is plenty of parking, even as temperatures creeped above freezing today.The only quasi-surprise so far is that Florida governor Ron DeSantis has suspended his campaign already, although that seemed more a question of when not if, considering his poor showing in Iowa after spending more than $100 million campaigning.

Friday

The Spectator

The House GOP’s circular firing squad

From our US edition

The smallest-ever House Republican majority is squabbling once again, and the irony is that much of the frustration is focused on a tiny group of Republicans who tanked what they claimed to want last year.The usual gang of safe-district Republicans, Republicans running for higher office and anti-team players are agitating to shut down the border or shut down the government, even though many of them voted against a bill last year that would have implemented meaningful border security provisions and cut spending — even with divided government. Ironically, the then-chair of the Freedom Caucus, Scott Perry, negotiated this deal — which included the entirety of the House GOP’s border security package with the exception of strengthening the E-Verify immigration system.