Commentariat

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Lib Dem Voice had an interesting conversation under the title What should political bloggers be trying to achieve?, where Brian Coleman was used as an example of a search term that had been targeted by the Lib Dems in Google. This was the relevant bit of the conversation about Brian Coleman AM, the London Assembly Member for Barnet (the Lib Dems think he is a bit thin up top) and Camden.

The story is that Brian Coleman was the one who had a go at Lynne Featherstone for calling the Fire Brigade when her boiler made a funny noise, and the Lib Dems don’t like him as a result.

I thought I’d have a test on Google to see how we get on competing for a term such as “Brian Coleman” with the Liberal Democrat blogs on their top rated story for Brian Coleman: “Brian Coleman AM and his taxi bills”

(Click on the title to read the whole article)

It was my friend Gill, who has a son in the same school as Louis, who pointed out that, according to this year’s Parent Handbook, I am the new Media Studies teacher. “You dark horse,” she said, and I asked what on earth she was talking about. “Look under the list of teachers,” she said. And there I was. Or there I seemed to be, albeit with the addition of an extra L to my name: “Rebecca Tyrrell,” it said, “Media Studies”.

Guy Ritchie hasn’t been shy of late. Understandable, what with a new film out and his wife’s world tour to promote. Still, there was one subject he was reluctant to discuss when chatting with Pandora: his erstwhile religion, Kabbalah.

I acknowledge the traditional keepers of this land on which we gather in our nation’s capital; their successors, and those who have come before me: their dignified service; their diligence and pledge; their important efforts in recognising, encouraging, and unifying Australians. I feel deeply the gravity of the role bestowed on me today as I stand before you in this Senate Chamber.

Three years ago, Londoners noticed that a sort of Victorian space shuttle seemed to have crashed into one of its most famous streets. They telephoned their friends, and their friends telephoned their friends. Shortly afterwards, a giant puppet of a small girl emerged, soon to be joined by a colossal puppet of an elephant.

I have a confession to make. I love not one despised style of music, but two: heavy metal, and country& western. As they scroll down my iPod, my friends weep – and retch. And it gets worse: I believe these eruptions of noise offer a political parable. Really: set aside your prejudices and your earplugs and stock up on metal and country. You will slowly see we have misunderstood two of the most politically charged, politically reviled places on earth: the Muslim world, and the Deep South. Don’t turn the page over; stay with me.

There is already famine in Africa but it is not the fault of the Soil Association or British organic food markets. Up to 14 million people in the Horn of Africa are at risk of starvation and this has little to do with Western-imposed attitudes to organic farming. Millions more are suffering in Zimbabwe, and food riots have flared from Egypt to Mozambique. The root of the problem in almost every case is political, not scientific.

“Too big to fail” is an expression that well suits Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson warned yesterday that these two institutions "are so large and interwoven in our financial system that a failure of either of them would create great turmoil in financial markets here and around the globe”. He was right. He might even have been understating things. For if Freddie and Fannie had been allowed to go under, what we have seen of the credit crunch thus far would have been a mere prelude to a much more profound slump - one comparable to the Great Depression of the 1930s, the last time the banks simply stopped lending. Global financial turmoil would have been the beginning of it.

Few British MPs have ever been expelled from Parliament and sent to prison. Among the handful were a couple of Jacobites and John Wilkes, the radical hero who fled to America to avoid trial for libel in the reign of George III. Will the Liberal Democrat MP Lembit Opik be the next to join them?

Nicolas Sarkozy faces a hard task when he travels to Moscow today in an attempt to bridge East-West differences over the Georgia crisis that have, if anything, widened in recent weeks. A month after the Georgian government launched its ill-fated assault on the breakaway region of South Ossetia, the French President, who holds the EU presidency, has to persuade Russia to abide by the six-point peace plan he brokered. This would involve Russia withdrawing forces from Georgia proper, agreeing to the free movement of monitors in a buffer zone between South Ossetia and Georgia and initiating a framework for security talks between Tblisi and Moscow.

The annual conference of the Trades Union Congress opens in Brighton today with a varied agenda but one that is bound to be overshadowed by continuing speculation about Gordon Brown’s leadership. Although unions clearly do not wield anything like the same power within the Labour Party that they did 30 years ago, when they all but terrorised the governments of Harold Wilson and Jim Callaghan, they remain a significant force, not least because of their financial donations. Their voice is important when doubts arise about the party leadership.

Fashion designer known as the ’signora of elegance’ whose classic clothes were cut with austerity and wit.

“I don’t mind a good fight,” John McCain told the Republican faithful last week, “and for reasons known only to God I’ve had quite a few tough ones in my life.” But even for this former prisoner of war in North Vietnam turned battle-seasoned Senator often at odds with his own party, no fight will be as tough as the one he faces over the next eight weeks, if he is to defy every law of politics and win the White House.

The most succinct word association for the Commentariat I have come across:

back-channel media.

A Freudian slip with more than a grain of truth.

Gordon Brown spoke for us all when, last week, he described the Burmese government’s dismal failure to respond in an even remotely adequate way to the cyclone that struck the Irrawaddy delta as “intolerable”.

Among the chic plots of the Chelsea Flower Show, there are some gardens this year that are proving far from lovesome.

Ben Leapman, our intrepid correspondent, secured another impressive victory at the High Court last week after Michael Martin, the Commons Speaker, had appealed the decision to release an itemised list of their expenses.

The Bank of England has proclaimed the end of the ‘nice’ decade: so what next asks Dan Roberts.

Richard Chartres says the Church of England is grateful to The Sunday Telegraph for its renewed focus on the great need to help local communities open up their churches for broader public use, without losing their sacred character.

Some by-elections dramatise significant shifts in the political landscape, writes Matthew d’Ancona.

The Marital Ratings Scale was invented by an American agony uncle, Dr George Crane, and it gives positive and negative ratings to a variety of wifely behaviours, says Jemima Lewis.

Elaine Paige’s car has been in dock for three weeks so she’s got to walk across the Albert Bridge, but she thanks goodness for musical theatre.

Cherie Blair’s telling of intimate tales from her marriage is very much ‘à la mode’ in our culture of compulsive disclosure, says Jenny McCartney.

A neat publisher’s trick for selling yet more copies of a book that has been a bestseller for years is the replica anniversary edition, and this year, the field is held by The Wind in the Willows, writes Melanie McDonagh.

Many farmers have become so alarmed by the apparent unreliability of a highly controversial new blood test for their livestock, that they are lining up to have it ruled on by the High Court, writes Christopher Booker.