The Iraq Inquiry: some helpful texts (with 27 Nov 09 up-date)
With the aim of assisting the Chilcot Inquiry with its preparations for questioning Tony Blair about how he led us into war with Iraq, I have put some key texts on my website —...
Category: Politics
EU’s good appointments, UK media’s dismal coverage
The EU’s appointments of the Belgian prime minister Herman van Rompuy (what comical names these foreigners do have![1]) as permanent Chairman (“President”) of the European Council, and (subject to the approval of the European...
A referendum on the UK’s EU membership? Please not yet!
In an eloquent article on Our Kingdom, David Marquand, the academic, former Labour MP and later chief adviser (1977-78) to Roy Jenkins as President of the European Commission, laments that the Britain he’s proud...
The Guardian on what Tony Blair’s middle east job isn’t
Last month I submitted a letter to the Guardian pointing out that the same day’s issue had wrongly described Tony Blair’s job in the middle east as that of ‘peace envoy’. What happened next...
Classifying drugs: the Home Secretary and the David Nutt case (with 5 Nov 09 Update)
It’s worth trying to identify some of the confusions that have arisen in the controversy over the action of the normally mild-mannered Home Secretary, Alan Johnson, in dismissing Professor David Nutt from his post...
The “President of Europe” and some other misconceptions
The sudden burst of media interest in the fading possibility of Tony Blair being chosen to be something erroneously described as “President of Europe” has given rise to an extraordinary number of misconceptions and...
Question Time with the BNP: cui bono?
There’s been no shortage of strongly argued reactions to the BBC programme Question Time, starring the malodorous British National Party’s leader Nick Griffin. (You can still watch the whole thing online here.) We’re forcefully...
The Noblemen of the UK Supreme Court
As every UK newspaper-reader and television-watcher ought to, but probably doesn’t, know, since the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876, the judicial work of the House of Lords has been done only by the 12 most...
Will everyone please stop obsessing about debt and start worrying about unemployment?
In a Comment is Free article about the Tory obsession with the level of Britain’s national debt, Ken Livingstone aptly quotes the distinguished Conservative economist Sir Samuel Brittan writing in the Financial Times on...
On being nasty to the ‘first lady’ (not)
In today’s Observer the columnist Catherine Bennett makes a spiteful attack on Sarah Brown, the prime minister’s wife, principally for her failure to denounce the practice of female genital mutilation when she spoke briefly...