Putin’s power play
From our UK edition
Read this excellent piece on the Putin missile row in the DT by Anne Applebaum (a Contributing Editor at the Spectator, when she is not winning Pulitzer Prizes and writing for the Washington Post).
The Spectator
Tuesday
Monday
Some mothers do ‘ave ’em
From our UK edition
You would have thought that Lindsey Lohan’s mum would be a little suspicious of the whole showbiz tread mill what with her daughter checking into rehab for a month. But no, she’s in talks to put her two younger children—aged 11 and 14—on a reality show in which she’ll try and turn them into tabloid fodder, or depending on your point of view young starlets with a great future ahead of them. Also in celebrity land, one has to love the fact that the LAPD mug shot of Paris Hilton looks like a typical modelling shot. For the next 23 days, the outside world will be a Hilton-free-zone. Enjoy this while it lasts because once she’s out there’ll be no escaping her what with the prison diaries, the talk show appearances etc, etc..
No go with the logo
From our UK edition
I am a big fan of the London Olympics but I am not a fan of their new logo. It looks like one of the puzzles from the Krypton Factor c.1977 or a very bad local authority advert for a Festival of Fitness. Apparently it is meant to appeal to the “Google Generation”. Dear me, no.
Sunday
Tory grassroots vent their anger at Cameron and Willetts
From our UK edition
ConservativeHome’s regular survey of Tory activists, the same one that got the leadership result pretty much spot on, shows that David Cameron’s popularity with the grassroots has been badly dented by the grammar school debacle with his net satisfaction down from +49% to +22%. David Willetts is bearing the brunt of the party’s displeasure, though. His satisfaction rating has fallen 60 points to minus 24 percent; making him the most unpopular member of the shadow cabinet. No shadow minister has received such a low score since the survey started back at the beginning of Cameron’s tenure.
Name that job
From our UK edition
Following the Coffee House debate a few days back on the lunacy of referring to "gangs" as "groups", I was delighted by the revelation in today's Mail on Sunday that an Islington primary school has decided that the headmaster should now be called the "lead learner". What would Thomas Arnold have made of that redesignation, I wonder? And why stop there? Let's call surgeons "health helpers" and psychiatrists "brain buddies". Prison warders should be "incarceration facilitators", while police officers might feel more comfortable re-titled "liaison workers with the criminal community". And Stephen Hawking would surely be less forbidding if he were called an "atomic aide", just there to help out with the tricky business of the origins of the universe.
Saturday
Letters to the Editor | 2 June 2007
Major achievements Sir: I enjoyed and applauded Matthew Parris’s piece (Another voice, 26 May). It is indeed time that Sir John Major’s legacy was recognised and that he be remembered for those two acts that will leave what I hope will be an indelible mark on our daily life. Having been involved with cultural institutions that have been wholly renewed with Lottery money, I can only hope that its introduction will be remembered as his great contribution to this country. Let us fervently hope that this administration’s raid for the Olympics is resisted with maximum force by the current trustees to allow it to continue its remarkable work. Also let us remember his keeping sterling out of the eurozone by negotiating our opt-out of monetary union.
The Blair story
From our UK edition
To John Self, Charles Highway and Keith Talent must now be added another unforgettable Martin Amis character: Tony Blair. Today's must read is the author's eyewitness account in the Guardian of the PM's last days. There are plenty of classic Amis phrases. I particularly enjoyed ; "the white-lipped and bloody-minded persistence of the question of Iraq"; the description of John Prescott as a "battered sensualist"; "the full totalitarian motorcade" in Washington; and Gordon Brown as "all fish and chips and Woodbine" compared to the sleek Blair. Amis is refreshingly candid about the "mildly but deplorably flirtatious" relationship he quickly established with his subject: this, after all, is what Blair does, to individuals and to nations."You’ve got steel.
Join the Brady Bunch
From our UK edition
Why has the Tory grammar- school row raged for so long? It is glib to suggest, as some have, that it is simply filling a news vacuum as the political world awaits the ascension of Prime Minister Brown and averts its gaze from the slow car crash of the Labour deputy leadership contest. The truth is that Mr Brown and the six contenders to succeed John Prescott cannot believe their luck. Just when Labour was expecting embarrassing scrutiny of Mr Brown’s coronation and the Wacky Races of the battle for the deputy’s job, the Conservatives have contrived to mount an unexpectedly protracted bout of ‘Tory turmoil’: the first since David Cameron became leader in December 2005.
Friday
The new Paris
From our UK edition
Paris Hilton’s coming incarceration and Lindsay Lohan’s trip to rehab creates an opening for a new party girl to keep the paparazzi employed though the summer, the red tops in copy and the rest of us entertained. New York Magazine have done us all a service by providing a guide to the runners and riders in the great It-girl steeplechase—and you’ll be glad to know that there’s plenty of British representation. The Brit pack consists of Lily Allen who gets points for declaring that anyone who paid for Paris Hilton’s music album should be put down.
Stating the obvious
From our UK edition
Bewildered rage has greeted Cardinal Keith O'Brien's announcement that abortion is a bad thing and that Catholics should be against it. He has been accused of using threatening and inflammatory language and of "punishing" pro-choice Catholic politicians by seeking to exclude them from the Church. He has done no such thing. In a sermon at St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh, yesterday to mark the 40th anniversary of the Abortion Act, the leader of Scotland’s Roman Catholics urged medical schools to teach that all human life deserves protection, and called on hospitals to end tests designed to target and kill the weak and infirm.
How to Survive without Government
From our UK edition
Wales scored a first in the modern political history of Britain this last month. It became the first area of the UK to survive-quite happily-without an elected government. For over three weeks after the inconclusive elections to the Cardiff Asembly the parties squabbled on who should form a coalition. Meanwhile, schools, hospitals and transport systems continued to operate and life continued much as before. Under-developed,de-industrialised countries do of course always benefit from the shock effect and overall stimulation which spreads throughout the body politic when government withdraws from the scene and stops giving itself too much to do.
It was forty years ago today…
From our UK edition
Sergeant Pepper always cheers me up because – aside from its musical brilliance – it is slightly older than I am. Today’s papers are full of readable celebrations of the album’s anniversary, including a Guardian leader and a “where is she now?” piece in The Times on the Lucy of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”. My favourite track, by a whisker, is still “She’s Leaving Home”. What do other Coffee Housers think?
‘Im worried about Lesley’
From our UK edition
Now that Big Brother's returned for its summer run what does it tell us about the political mind of Britain? Leaders-and deputy leaders-come and go, manifestos get launched,opposition spokesmen are sacked and ministers do u-turns. But it's the cultural mood which decides whether a party's time is up or not. Brown's arrival and Brady's departure,Blears's bid and Cooper's HIPs (deceased) play into that mood and reflect the shifting scene. And reality tv really does tell us what television executives have decided about what the cultural stereotypes should be and how they perform on the scene.
Depressing story of the day
From our UK edition
The Portuguese police are now using, of all things, tip-offs from mystics in the search for Madeleine McCann. It is hard to remember a police operation that has been so comprehensively or publicly bungled.
Thursday
The row that will not die
From our UK edition
The Evening Standard has the latest twist in the grammar school row. Dominic Grieve, the shadow A-G, has backed building more grammars in Kent seemingly in contradiction of the party’s no new grammars policy. But CCHQ is spinning that Grieve isn’t going against the party line as more grammars can be built to “maintain the status quo.” The story runs on the front of the Standard under the headline “TORY RETREAT ON GRAMMARS”. So, the one thing that some Cameroons claimed had been gained—the impression that Cameron is a strong leader facing down his party—from the debacle has been lost. This really is a case of bad policy, badly presented.
A grim reality
From our UK edition
Nothing better sums up everything that is wrong with this country and our culture than Big Brother. Yet, the public is still fascinated by it and the idea of having an all-female house has won the show acres of space in the red tops. This morning on the tube the majority of people in my carriage were all studying Metro’s form guide intently. After the whole Big Brother racism row, there was much hopeful talk about how we’d finally turn our backs on this vile concept. But 6 million people tuned in last night, only a million down on last year’s launch. Indeed, I suspect that if we had our own win a kidney reality show it would get record viewing figure. Anyway, expect the twins Sam and Amanda to be F-list celebs by the end of the series.
Quitting on the NHS
From our UK edition
It seems strange that Nice has agreed that the NHS should pay for Champix, the new anti-smoking drug, while at the same time refusing to endorse, for example, Aricept, Exelon and Reminyl for those in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, and Avastin and Alimta for cancer. Cost-effective arguments don’t really wash — how does one cost the saving to the state of, for instance, a person with dementia being able to lead a relatively independent life and not having to rely on the state? If a 12-week course of Champix doesn’t work, will an addict be given a second chance, or a third or a fourth?
The truth about dirty dancing
From our UK edition
Stephen has a good post on really bad films. I have never understood the appeal of the dreadful Dirty Dancing, nor its passage into Rocky Horror-style cult status. So this Guardian piece about staying in Baby's cabin is my idea of the naughty step times a thousand: a sort of cultural Guantanamo Bay. Will someone explain why this film is still allowed to be shown in public places, let alone to inspire holidays?
Wednesday
Is this man the next Ronald Reagan?
From our UK edition
The Republican presidential field just got even more crowded with the news that former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson is jumping in. You probably know Thomspon’s face, if not his name, as he’s been in a whole slew of movies including The Hunt for Red October, Die Hard 2 and In the Line of Fire. His backers think that his star role in the hit US legal drama Law and Order will propel him into the top tier of candidates—and they’re probably right. Thompson’s entry into the race is a function of dissatisfaction with the rest of the GOP field. Only three of the current crop are even plausibly electable: Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney. Yet all of them have major flaws as far as the Republican base is concerned.
Oklahoma!
From our UK edition
A work of meticulous scholarship has appeared entirely devoted to the 1943 musical and it sets new standards of accuracy in what has been a gossipy milieu. From the distinguished publishers Yale, it is written by Tim Carter who is David G. Frey Distinguished Professor of Music and Chair of the Music Department, University of North Carolina; among his previous works is Monteverdi's Musical Theatre and he is not messing about. He tells you all you could possibly want to know and perhaps a bit more about who contributed what to which song, why it was dropped before the opening night, indeed exactly what did happen in New Haven.