From our US edition
Hezbollah and genocide From Lord KalmsSir: William Hague’s usual good sense has deserted him. Criticising Israel for being disproportionate without serious consideration of the alternatives merely mouths the buzzwords of the ignorant armchair critic. Think again, William, for whom you speak. How do you deal with the Hezbollah leader Nasrallah, who is committed to Israel’s
The old order changeth, yielding place to new: as Fidel Castro’s mortality marks the fall of the last Cold War colossus, so a new global ideological struggle hardens in our midst. The conflict in the Middle East is but one symptom of this battle between the West and militant Islam. To extract this particular crisis
Lebanon: who’s to blame? From Nicholas MillmanSir: It was refreshing to read your editorial (22 July) after a week of witnessing the rest of the British media sadly misrepresent the Middle East crisis. In typical fashion Hezbollah has manipulated the journalists on the ground to the point where, for example, Channel 4 News must now
The Blair–Bush summit in Washington was long-planned, but fortuitously well-timed. The President and Prime Minister face not only a huge strategic challenge in the Middle East but also a fundamental political problem at home. They have not yet managed to persuade Western voters of the path they have jointly pursued in the region. Neither man
Cameron on crime From Oliver Letwin MPSir: Your leading article ‘Love isn’t all you need’ (15 July) misses the point of David Cameron’s speech on the causes of crime (indeed, it gives the impression that you did not read the speech very closely). David’s speech focused from the very beginning on the fear and suffering
At a time of global tension and regional bloodshed, it is easy for governments to retreat behind rhetorical platitudes and uncontroversial diplomatic ‘initiatives’. As Clausewitz observed: ‘Although our intellect always longs for clarity and certainty, our nature often finds uncertainty fascinating.’ In the case of the Middle East conflagration, such lazy fascination would be disastrous.
Tories must leave the EPP From Douglas Carswell MPSir: Fraser Nelson should ask himself why Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkozy and the rest of Old Europe’s political elite are so desperate to keep the Conservatives in the EPP (Politics, 8 July). It is precisely because they recognise the importance of maintaining their ideological monopoly. Once we
The language of priorities is the religion of socialism, said Nye Bevan. In fact, the setting of priorities is the basis of all practical politics. This is one of many reasons that David Cameron’s speech on social justice and crime this week was his worst error to date. It suggested — to an alarming extent
Elite electorates From Alan HallSir: I was amused by your leading article this week (1 July), criticising New Labour for treating ‘the highest office of government’ as if it were ‘the captaincy of its own team’. You affect to be shocked that the debate on who should succeed Tony Blair is not being conducted, so
Any relationship, ‘special’ or otherwise, depends upon clarity, fairness and reciprocity. The US–UK extradition treaty signed in March 2003, ratified in this country the following year, boasts none of those features. As a consequence, three British businessmen — David Bermingham, Gary Mulgrew, and Giles Darby — face imminent extradition from this country to Texas over
Prison doesn’t work From Peter J.M. WayneSir: That not one but two highly indignant letters to the editor (24 June) should have been occasioned by my humanitarian concerns about children in prison (Books, 17 June) is a sad and disturbing reflection of the cruel and punitive mood that dominates the whole stagnant debate about crime
When Tony Blair campaigned for the rewriting of Clause 4, his mantra was that Labour ‘must mean what we say, and say what we mean’. The symbol of this supposed new transparency was the ‘pledge card’: my word is my bond, Mr Blair declared to anyone who would listen. It is worth remembering such claims
Age of innocence? From Mrs Sam JettubreckSir: Having lived in the same street for many years and seen the area gradually taken over by feral youths, I wonder what Peter J.M. Wayne might suggest I do to stem the rising tide of crime in my street? ‘These are children …for goodness sake,’ wrote Wayne in
John Reid declared last week that his ‘starting point’ on convicted paedophiles was ‘that information [related to their whereabouts] should no longer remain the exclusive preserve of officialdom’. For daring to make this perfectly reasonable comment — and sending one of his ministers to America to investigate the procedures used there — the Home Secretary
Al-Bashir’s immunity From Ralph Blumenau Sir: Peter Oborne’s powerful piece about the ethnic cleansing in Darfur and eastern Chad (‘Darfur’s terrible export’, 10 June) has only one strange omission. Here, as in almost all media reports, we are told that ‘the Sudanese government’ is actively helping the murderous Janjaweed, but the dictator who heads that
After the initial horror — 9/11, Madrid, 7 July The purpose of terrorism is not only to cause bloodshed, but also to spray psychological shrapnel across the societies it attacks and seeks to subvert. After the initial horror — 9/11, Madrid, 7 July — the strategic objective is to force democracies, in their rage and panic, to
Schools for success From Barnaby Lenon Sir: Robert Yates rightly explains that grammar schools were the path to academic success and a good job for clever working-class children in the period 1935 to 1975 (‘Grammar schools are liberal, Mr Cameron’, 3 June). To these should be added the many direct-grant schools, independent schools that charged
The emergency water-rationing measures now affecting 13 million people across the south-east have rekindled memories of the last serious drought to afflict the country, in 1976. Britain in many ways is an unrecognisable country from the Britain of 30 years ago, when scraggy figures in flared trousers queued up at the standpipes. But one thing
Two kinds of don From Joseph PalleySir: Boris Johnson laments the declining quality of British universities, with growth in student numbers outpacing funding (‘Farewell to the Young Ones’, 27 May). The problem is not just financial but cultural. It has always been assumed that university lecturers, as good teachers, will automatically be good researchers. This
John Prescott has always claimed to be one of the unacknowledged founders of New Labour. It is certainly true that he took an early lead in modernising the party’s structure, championing the Private Finance Initiative and the coining of slogans: ‘traditional values in a modern setting’ came from the Prescott camp, not the restaurants of