Commentariat

You are browsing the archives of 2008 July.

Dave Walker was not alone. Two other bloggers who have gone public with their Cease and Desists from Mark Brewer

Flag-carrying airlines used to be potent symbols of a country’s pride. No more. British Airways and Spain’s Iberia are the latest of Europe’s national airlines to…

David Miliband’s challenge has galvanised Westminster this week. Beyond the frenzied analysis about whether the foreign secretary’s actions amount to a direct bid for…

The downfall of Ehud Olmert, Israel’s prime minister, plunges the country, and the prospects for Middle East peace, into a fresh state of flux. His successor faces the…

The downfall of Ehud Olmert, Israel’s prime minister, plunges the country, and the prospects for Middle East peace, into a fresh state of flux. His successor faces the…

British Gas’s parent company lifts dividend payment to shareholders after hiking gas prices 35%

Letters: Just a thought for traditional Labour voters who are in despair over Gordon Brown

Letters: On Sunday I attempted to buy some frozen broad beans. Is it a nationwide conspiracy or is there a more mundane answer?

Editorial: Thousands of Britons are scrambling to Spain to get their annual fix of sun, just as they do every year

Editorial: David Miliband has become a candidate without a contest, after an ostentatious week

Simon Lewis: E.ON’s claims for coal are deluded. We can’t afford the huge environmental cost of burning this fuel

Jesse Armstrong: We’ve now heard the foreign secretary’s very quiet roar - and noticed that bulge in his trousers

Rachel Shabi: The resignation of Israel’s prime minister leaves him freer to act than his successor, whose need for votes will come first

Mark Lawson: Those who invoke a great British past might get a shock if forced to live their lives then, instead of these privileged times

John Kampfner: Britain’s loss of clout is not down to the prime minister alone. But he’s done his bit. There’s much to repair, Mr Miliband

Response: Community service has its place, but prisons are there for the most serious type of criminal, says David Hanson

Editorial: As Israel enters a turbulent leadership contest, it should make every effort to do no more harm

Duncan Campbell: US courts can guarantee little justice for a curious British hacker who now faces trial as a terrorist

Colin Luckhurst: Cotswolds

Today’s corrections

Hugh Muir: There they were, the favoured, enjoying a memorable few moments with Barack Obama

Letters: Those who hold an absolutist view should not be dismissed as simply peddling metaphysics

Since this year has given us Harold Macmillan at the National Theatre, Doctor
Who on the box and teenage delinquents in the headlines, it would be no
surprise to hear that Lyons tea houses are about to make a comeback. But for
a glimpse of how far we have travelled over the past half-century, nothing
is more revealing than a film released 50 years ago today. Shot in an army
barracks outside Guildford, it cost £73,000 to make, recouped £500,000 at
the box office and made this newspaper’s reviewer laugh “every now and
again”. Its title was Carry On Sergeant.

So the Cartier Polo International was happy to invite a man convicted of
assault on an elderly couple, dozens of aristocrats and an assortment of
would-be actresses in minuscule dresses. But it wouldn’t have me. More than
35,000 people came to the polo match last weekend but I was excluded.

Bear with me, if you will, while I skim through a random selection of people who in one way or another were found in possession of Class A drugs in recent months.