tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36648122011-04-22T05:43:54.782Zwww.ukconservatism.com_noreply@blogger.comBlogger7121100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-912847342003-03-24T16:02:00.000Z2003-12-11T05:10:13.590Z

This page has moved ... This page is now located at http://concom.blogspot.com. Please update your links.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-912785232003-03-24T13:51:00.000Z2003-03-24T13:51:50.560Z

I AM SLOWLY completing the move over to Movable Type right now. So there may not be as many posts as you would expect.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-912251362003-03-23T15:04:00.000Z2003-03-23T17:11:39.000Z

Hey Saddam ... Not my own work, I hasten to add.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-912012142003-03-23T00:32:00.000Z2003-03-23T00:32:27.043Z

Link of the Week THE LINK OF THIS WEEK is to Protest Warrior, a great new right-of-centre page devoted to joining leftist and anti-war protests and inserting a few facts in between all the emotive rhetoric. Their posters in particular are marvellous.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-911991232003-03-22T23:31:00.000Z2003-03-23T17:25:09.000Z

Personal Reflections on Blairite Britain WALKING INTO MY town centre at about 4pm on Tuesday, I suddenly heard a rough voice calling out "Ye think yer hard? One punch from me and ye'd be on the floor with yer mouth fulla blood all spillin' out!". As I continued walking, I glanced at the person who'd said it, and two things struck me. First was that he was no silly teenage yob, but was

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-911741842003-03-22T10:33:00.000Z2003-03-22T10:39:43.000Z

New Political BritBlog helps the Right stay in the lead JUST AS I was beginning to worry that Britain's left was catching up in blogland, Au Currant pops up on the scene. Despite its name, the page is neither French nor Francophile, but solidly Anglo-American and pleasingly right of centre, featuring many varied and interesting posts. If you are now visiting the page under the impression

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-911657332003-03-22T05:23:00.000Z2003-03-22T09:06:11.000Z

Road map for appeasement I AM IMMENSELY FEARFUL of those who are now arguing that the Bush Administration should put as much effort and vigour into bringing peace between Israel and the Palestinians as it did in fighting Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. My fear is not just that it sounds so reasonable at first sight, but also at the way in which even people on the Right are quite willing

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-911575002003-03-22T01:54:00.000Z2003-03-22T01:54:54.593Z

Quote of the Day "The United Nations should pass a resolution prohibiting the sun from rising while they are at it." - A Freeper's response to Jacques Chirac's declaration that he will use the French veto to force the UN to oppose any post-war administration of Iraq by Britain and America

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-911462422003-03-21T21:29:00.000Z2003-03-21T21:37:43.000Z

The first free Iraqis celebrate their liberation AS COALITION FORCES entered Sawfan, Baghdad, tearing down the great imposing portraits of Saddam Hussein, here are some of the reactions of Iraqi civilians at last freed from his tyranny. Milling crowds of men and boys watched as the Marines attached ropes on the front of their Jeeps to one portrait and then backed up, peeling the Iraqi

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-911003852003-03-21T03:24:00.000Z2003-03-21T15:04:35.000Z

Heroes 12 COALITION PERSONNEL, 8 British and 4 American, have been killed in a helicopter accident in Kuwait.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910965552003-03-21T02:10:00.000Z2003-03-21T02:10:41.936Z

They care about Iraqis so much they'd rather Bush lost power than Saddam MORE ASTONISHMENT ABOUND on the Guardian forums, which really are the British equivalent of the notorious Democratic Underground. I decided to test their commitment to Iraqi civilians by posing a simple question - if they could remove only one leader from power, would it be Saddam Hussein or George W. Bush? No prizes

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910963462003-03-21T02:06:00.000Z2003-03-21T02:23:12.000Z

Worth trying ... A COUPLE OF IDEAS that just occurred to me: Perhaps we should offer Iraq membership of the Commonwealth, with the Queen as their Head of State. If something bothers me about plans to democratise places like Iraq and Afghanistan, it's the way the democracy in question works out as being very much like the American system of government. A monarchy would probably suit Iraq

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910907502003-03-21T00:18:00.000Z2003-03-21T00:25:19.000Z

Does Woody Allen count as an Israeli? REASONED CRITICISM OF Israeli government policies is of course legitimate and may not be tinged with racial prejudice at all. But the anti-Semitism of some Palestinian supporters is so obvious it's almost funny that they can deny it. On Question Time just now, someone alleged that because there are so many Israelis in the US Government, American policy

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910412282003-03-20T05:39:00.000Z2003-03-20T06:35:58.000Z

Combine David Irving and Gerry Adams and the new Palestinian PM is what you get NISSAN RATSLAV-KATZ argues that Arafat's appointment of Mahmous Abbas as Prime Minister is not the sign of hope that many believe it to be. Apart from long-standing involvement in terrorism and support for the present attacks, the man described by the BBC as an "intellectual" and an "author of several books"

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910375712003-03-20T04:30:00.000Z2003-03-21T01:21:43.000Z

Not all Muslims think alike, BBC ONE OF THE worst things about political correctness is the way members of favoured minority groups lose their individuality and instead are classified in terms their self-appointed representatives choose. Instead of reporting that some mouthy black bureaucrat takes x view, media happily report that the 'black community' believes x, as if black people are

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910313282003-03-20T02:54:00.000Z2003-03-20T04:31:22.000Z

It's war at last THE SECOND GULF WAR HAS BEGUN, the White House has just confirmed.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910291842003-03-20T02:18:00.000Z2003-03-20T02:21:32.000Z

The land must come after the peace EXCELLENT POST AT Right Wing News on the new 'road map for peace' in the Middle East. As John Hawkins shows, Palestinians generally don't want peace, and their desire for a two-state settlement is only part of a longer-term plan for a single state, uncontaminated by all dem Jews. The road map is nothing original, just the umpteenth 'land for peace' deal,

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910246042003-03-20T00:35:00.000Z2003-03-20T01:14:39.000Z

Opportunism knocked and Charles Kennedy answered MATTHEW TURNER ASKS why the Liberal Democrats are accused of opportunism merely because as a party they have united behind a line that (at least until recently) happens to be popular. I think they have been disgustingly opportunistic, and that this is apparent in their constantly changing position on war, and their new reverence for the

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910130542003-03-19T21:00:00.000Z2003-03-19T21:02:26.000Z

Even more than Blair, Brown is the continuity candidate THE ECONOMIST REGARDS Gordon Brown as the only serious contender for the Labour leadership should Tony Blair fall under the proverbial bus. It also makes the interesting point that a Brown premiership would mean more continuity of present policy than if Blair himself were to remain Prime Minister. Blair, recently radicalised, has come

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910097372003-03-19T20:00:00.000Z2003-03-19T20:11:19.000Z

He cares only about France and himself PRESIDENT CHIRAC HAS enjoyed a recent popularity surge among the left for his intransigence. These misguided folks think he genuinely cares about Iraq or any issue beyond France's oil contracts with Saddam and her wider interest in dividing Britain and the United States. I hope that upon reading Stephen Pollard's post on Le President, from which the

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910096552003-03-19T19:59:00.000Z2003-03-19T20:10:29.000Z

Quote of the Day "I'm sure that as a leader he loves his people" - Jacques Chirac on Saddam Hussein, the only tyrant in history to gas his own people

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-910015112003-03-19T17:31:00.000Z2003-03-19T17:31:59.780Z

More 'patriots' against the war LISTEN TO SOME of the bile pouring from the lips of Guardianistas who oppose any liberation of Iraq. Someone asked whether those against the war should support British troops in the coming conflict. Here are some of the most sickening responses. They made their choice when they took the queen's/president's shilling. They agreed to fight and kill and die

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-909999532003-03-19T17:03:00.000Z2003-03-19T17:06:17.000Z

Jingoistic? Moi? "We don't want to fight but by jingo if we do, We've got the ships, we've got the men And got the money too. We've fought Saddam before And while we're Britons true The Iraqis shall not have nuclear weapons."

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-909960122003-03-19T15:50:00.000Z2003-03-20T19:36:14.000Z

It's Britain they hate I HAVE NOTHING original to say regarding Tony Blair's marvellous and passionate motion defending war yesterday. Nothing, that is, except to say that when he condemned the Liberal Democrats, who claimed that - unlike Labour and the Tories - they were united, by saying they were "united in opportunism and error", I've never felt so proud of a Prime Minister as I did

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-909211102003-03-18T13:36:00.000Z2003-03-18T13:36:37.140Z

Quote of the Day "[T]hose voting in Parliament today need to consider what sort of a nation Britain is. Ours is the only European country in the post-war era which has never shirked its obligation to try to preserve peace in the world and defend the interests of the West against its enemies. This fact has maintained our high military reputation, our global influence and our self-esteem

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-909154902003-03-18T10:47:00.000Z2003-03-18T10:52:46.000Z

There will be a war, the UN isn't behind it, but Short still won't give up her ministerial limo IF THERE IS a single method of operating worse than threats and blackmail, it's idle threats and blackmail you don't in the end carry out when your bluff is called. Clare Short's decision to remain in cabinet shows her to be just such an operator. I hope her supposed great conviction and

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908946962003-03-18T02:31:00.000Z2003-03-18T04:08:25.000Z

Ahem! No comment Courtesy of milspecgear.com:

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908921632003-03-18T01:51:00.000Z2003-03-18T02:04:00.000Z

America's US-hating 'patriots' GREAT POST OVER at Right-Wing-News on the outrageous placards of those peaceniks who make no secret of their hatred of everything America stands for, but in many cases nonetheless protest vigorously any claim that they are anti-American. Their fellow travellers in Britain and Europe don't have to pretend. But in America, for sound electoral and popularity

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908637982003-03-17T17:16:00.000Z2003-03-20T06:37:48.000Z

Wow! The Indy got it right ROBIN COOK, the last Foreign Secretary and the Leader of the House of Commons until today, has just left the government over Blair's Iraq policy. One wonders what he may say in his resignation speech. The BBC has an interesting analysis of this move, noting that Cook is the first Labour minister to resign on a matter of principle since the 1970s. The

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908606282003-03-17T16:15:00.000Z2003-03-17T16:15:06.280Z

The UN has failed in its last chance to prove itself relevant BUSH AND BLAIR have now abandoned efforts to get an eighteenth UN resolution condemning Saddam Hussein before launching military action.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908591912003-03-17T15:48:00.000Z2003-03-17T16:50:31.000Z

He's come out against war - he can't backpedal on this one AS WAR APPROACHES, we must remember all that Charles Kennedy has said about it, and not allow him to back-track once action starts and change his mind once the conflict is over. So here are some quotations from his speech in Torquay delivered yesterday. "Any war will cause a refugee crisis of huge proportions - not to mention

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908566792003-03-17T15:03:00.000Z2003-03-17T15:04:25.000Z

The last hours of peace WHILE UN INSPECTORS are withdrawn from Iraq as Saddam is given one last, final, last, final, final, last chance, the Prime Minister has announced an emergency cabinet meeting for 4pm. The Independent is predicting Robin Cook's resignation at that meeting. We shall see, as it begins in one hour.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908555552003-03-17T14:40:00.000Z2003-03-17T14:40:39.000Z

Quote of the Day "As far as I'm concerned, war always means failure" - Jacques Chirac "As far as France is concerned, you're right." - Rush Limbaugh

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908518212003-03-17T13:17:00.000Z2003-03-17T13:18:39.000Z

Doping them up can't replace discipline FUN PIECE FROM The Onion archives on the drug Ritalin, which "cures" every difficult child, is taking America by storm, and is unfortunately becoming more and more popular this side of the pond. Teachers are especially keen to recommend it, as it is an easy solution to their own discipline problems, but it's not something I hope any parent would use

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908513392003-03-17T13:04:00.000Z2003-03-17T13:10:51.000Z

The fascists aren't only in the BNP IF YOU WANT real insight into the mentality of members of the Socialist Worker's Party's Anti-Nazi League, look no further than their latest campaign to have a university student expelled, not because he has broken any college rules or laws, but because he is a leading member of the British National Party. Let's ignore for a moment the distaste every

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908122822003-03-16T18:47:00.000Z2003-03-16T18:56:54.000Z

Let's hope the peaceniks listen to the Stop the War Coalition in this case THE STOP THE WAR COALITION is encouraging all its supporters to walk out of their places of work to demonstrate and stir up trouble the day war is declared. I like this idea for two reasons. First, because general British common sense attitudes will soon prevail, with the vast majority of normal people coming in

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908103582003-03-16T17:53:00.000Z2003-03-16T17:57:30.000Z

Hypocrites start at Calais THIS IS ALMOST too good to be true: France, that self-proclaimed bastion of the United Nations, has unilaterally enforced regime change on foreign nations 37 times since 1960, without the support of the UN Security Council. Well, if what's good for the goose is good for the gander, then maybe what's good for the frog is good for the bulldog and the eagle.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908066082003-03-16T16:00:00.000Z2003-03-18T03:53:36.000Z

Diary of Conservative Spring Conference 2003 AT ABOUT 1PM YESTERDAY, I rushed late into a Conservative Christian Fellowship fringe meeting with Oliver Letwin, David Willets and John Hayes, each of whom was making the case for the conservative they most admired. Their choices were Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Disraeli and Edmund Burke. Their arguments were mainly of historical interest, but

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-908042902003-03-16T14:48:00.000Z2003-03-16T17:06:05.000Z

THE MOST RECENT comments to this site seem to have disappeared when Haloscan went down. Apparently they will reappear soon.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-907514212003-03-15T06:16:00.000Z2003-03-15T06:16:16.280Z

Link of the Week BEFORE I GO, I shall update the link of the week. The next is to 'Why I am not an Objectivist' by Michael Huemer. To anyone at all familiar with Ayn Rand's 'philosophy' and ideas, it can be fascinating. In great detail, he shows just how contradictory and awkward Rand's theories of selfishness and objectivism are, how individual rights are incompatible with egoism, and how

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906985062003-03-14T08:18:00.000Z2003-03-15T06:15:56.000Z

Short break ahead BARRING DISCOVERY OF a cheap internet cafe, there won't be any updates for a couple of days, as tomorrow morning I am off to the 2003 Conservative Spring Conference in Harrogate. As the blogosphere's official Tory Party Conference Correspondent, if anything interesting happens, I'll be back with a full report on Sunday evening or Monday. If you're also going and you

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906984432003-03-14T08:15:00.000Z2003-03-14T08:15:44.170Z

Brown as PM, Short as DPM? ACCORDING TO LABOUR MP DIANE ABBOTT and others, the latest gossip in Westminster is that Clare Short may have so strengthened her position with the Labour left in the last week, that should anything happen to Tony Blair, the dream ticket combination to follow him would be Gordon Brown as Labour leader with Clare Short as his deputy. Considering Brown's

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906979332003-03-14T07:59:00.000Z2003-03-14T08:36:30.000Z

President Bush 'till 2009? AFTER THE 5 NOVEMBER ELECTIONS, in which the Republicans captured the US Senate and made major gains in Congress, I took it for granted that Bush would be elected President in 2004. But more and more I keep reading from informed sources that this is not a certainty by any means. Looking over the Economist's predictions for 2003, which may have gone to print prior

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906546652003-03-13T17:06:00.000Z2003-03-13T17:19:50.000Z

How an aging population could be good for the Tories DISCUSSING DECLINING NEWSPAPER circulation, Stephen Glover mentions where he thinks the Telegraph is going wrong: My feeling is that it frets too much about not having enough young readers, and sometimes panders to them at the expense of its core readership. After all, with all the advances of modern medicine the old are going to live

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906505532003-03-13T15:54:00.001Z2003-03-13T16:12:10.000Z

A victory for life ON THE BACK of recent Republican victories, the new US Senate has just voted 2-1 to ban the evil partial-birth abortion procedure (see right), which involves the abortionist murdering a child while she is being born. The operation, which necessitates turning the baby upside-down and pulling all but the head out of the womb, before smashing the skull with a

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906505492003-03-13T15:54:00.000Z2003-03-13T16:14:39.000Z

Bush must follow in Queen Victoria's footsteps ASTONISHINGLY GOOD COVER STORY from Daniel Kruger in today's Spectator. His thesis is complex, but essentially he argues that the West as a whole is divided fundamentally into foxes and hedgehogs. The foxes, hippy-dippy postmodernist intellectuals who don't believe in objective truth or ethics - the sort of people who can't bring themselves to

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906449052003-03-13T12:44:00.000Z2003-03-13T12:44:59.000Z

Quote of the Day "Chris Patten, dripping with condescension, reflects on 'Margaret's quite simple views - balance the books, family values, national pride, rule of law, all policemen are honest'. Oh, my dear, how provincial can you get? The fact that those were precisely the attitudes that won her three elections seems to have passed him by." - Allison Pearson on Baroness Thatcher

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906442652003-03-13T12:26:00.000Z2003-03-13T12:26:04.920Z

UN or not, the Conservatives back war IAIN DUNCAN SMITH today left a Downing Street with Tony Blair expressing full support for the Prime Minister's position. Now the leaders of both main parties offically support war with Iraq whether or not there is an eighteenth UN resolution.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-906442612003-03-13T12:25:00.000Z2003-03-13T12:25:53.390Z

Moveable Type? HAVING HAD A proper web host for some time, I do sometimes wonder whether I should move over to moveable type blogging software. The advantages would be an ability to slot posts into categories and one, short, web address, rather than the short one that redirects (www.ukconservatism.com) and the long one that is off-putting to type (http://conservativecommentary.blogspot.com/)

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905975532003-03-12T17:48:00.000Z2003-03-12T17:57:23.000Z

A common sense start to improving the health service NHS WAITING LIST TARGETS have been indirectly responsible for much death and misery. For the sake of good government figures, doctors across the country have felt forced to give priority to patients easy to treat rather than the most serious and urgent cases. In response, the Conservatives have now wisely promised to scrap all waiting

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905964442003-03-12T17:27:00.000Z2003-03-12T17:36:59.000Z

Is the special relationship special for Britain? A DAY AND A HALF after it was revealed, I still find it hard to believe that the business contracts for the rebuiling of post-war Iraq have all been given to American companies. It isn't that the war itself has not yet begun that concerns me - planning for after it is over is just sensible forward-thinking. It is the blazen disregard for a

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905933692003-03-12T16:27:00.000Z2003-03-13T12:26:29.000Z

What allied bombers are dropping on Iraq right now THE LEAFLETS PRESENTLY being dropped on Iraq in preparation for war are interesting and varied, but get the point across. They warn (or, as the BBC says, threaten) against fighting coalition forces and make clear that the Iraqi people themselves are not the enemy.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905919062003-03-12T15:59:00.000Z2003-03-12T16:10:42.000Z

Group marriage would destroy marriage, and "same-sex" weddings are the final step to them STANLEY KURTZ IS a skilled defender of the family and marriage, and he returns to the subject today, reflecting on the latest threat to the institution. In a Canadian case, two women and a man are all requesting that they be declared the legal parents of a child. The judge is on their side, and only

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905868182003-03-12T14:17:00.000Z2003-03-12T14:17:16.733Z

In defence of France FRANCOPHILE ROD DREHER opposes the policies of the present French government, but his love of the country itself continues, and he writes well in its defence in the National Review. John Derbyshire last month gave the case for the prosecution with equal eloquence.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905830472003-03-12T12:41:00.000Z2003-03-12T13:17:26.000Z

It had to happen - PC Watch JOHN J. RAY and I have launched a new blog - PC Watch. We plan an Instapundit-style look at politically correct stupidity around the globe, and so far we've not been short of material. Check it out. Also, if you have an interest in perhaps being a contributor now and then, please email me. We're basically looking for anyone who keeps up with the news enough

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905717702003-03-12T06:16:00.000Z2003-03-12T09:54:51.000Z

^¬_¬^ Online GOOD ONLINE CHAT with John Redwood in yesterday's Guardian Online section. He didn't avoid all the tougher questions the way it is so easy to do, and he stayed to answer them for a full hour. My own ranged from the gushing ("Who are your favourite political columnists? Which is your favourite newspaper?") to the somewhat snide ("Do you regret your attempt at a Nazi-Soviet pact

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905186342003-03-11T12:56:00.000Z2003-03-12T05:48:29.000Z

The flaws in the case against war RATHER THAN MAKE the case for war, Mona Charen answers liberal arguments (or cliches) against it, and does so extremely convincingly. Violence is wrong? War never solves anything? Apart from securing American independence, ending slavery, and defeating Nazism and communism, war has never solved anything. What about the UN? For liberals, the

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905177802003-03-11T12:30:00.001Z2003-03-11T12:30:28.560Z

A good maxim - live by it AS JOHN BERCOW urges fellow Tories "not to oppose for the sake of opposing", I hope only that he can learn to apply this sage advice to his own attitude to his party.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905177762003-03-11T12:30:00.000Z2003-03-11T12:35:33.000Z

40,000 extra police - it's with policies like these that Conservatives once won elections OLIVER LETWIN HAS promised to use £2.1 billion per annum, saved by a quota on asylum seekers, to recruit more police officers. The Shadow Home Secretary's target is 40,000 extra by the end of a second four-year term of government. Eight years may be a long time in which to achieve it, but then it is

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905132212003-03-11T09:52:00.000Z2003-03-11T09:55:06.000Z

Matt on the Ron Davies scandal

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905124322003-03-11T09:21:00.000Z2003-03-11T09:30:43.000Z

Sensible welfare reform changes behaviour for the better WHEN CHANGING WELFARE RULES IN 1996, Newt Gingrich's Congress was warned of the terrible effects of such policies - poverty and misery would apparently be widespread among millions. What in fact happened is that huge numbers of former welfare mothers went out to find jobs, nearly doubling their household income, and nearly all

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905111332003-03-11T08:36:00.000Z2003-03-11T12:40:30.000Z

Tonge to retire JENNY TONGE, a rather mouthy Liberal Democrat MP and Clare Short's counterpart, has announced her intention to retire at the next election. Like Short herself, Jenny Tonge has been a leading leftwards influence on her party, opposing military action in Afghanistan and even the Blair government's feeble criticisms of Zimbabwean genocide, which she said sounded "colonial".

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905080152003-03-11T06:55:00.000Z2003-03-11T06:59:59.000Z

We've both learned from history IN AN OKAY PIECE, Bill O'Reilly comments on the similarities between the appeasement of seven decades ago, and the appeasement of today: Back in the 1930s, millions of people the world over simply did not want to think about the evil Hitler was brewing up. France and Russia were the chief appeasers, as they are today on the Iraq question... Britain went

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905062882003-03-11T06:11:00.000Z2003-03-11T06:18:08.000Z

A nuclear response to nuclear proliferation? VERY INTERESTING NATIONAL REVIEW article from John Derbyshire. He goes much further than I am presently willing to in suggesting that nuclear weapons may - and should - be used selectively in the war on terror. But his analysis is provocative and interesting. He notes the infamous response of Chamberlain's Air Minister Kingsley Wood to Leo

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-905023782003-03-11T04:49:00.000Z2003-03-11T04:57:52.000Z

John Major returns in spirit IN PRIVATE EYE'S hilarious Secret Diaries of John Major, there is one entry on the cabinet "bastards" which rather perfectly parodied his leadership. Sacking them would be a sign of weakness. The real strength is in keeping them in government in case they cause trouble on the backbenches. Is a better assessment of Tony Blair's reaction to Clare

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904998862003-03-11T04:02:00.000Z2003-03-11T04:02:10.826Z

Quote of the Day "Am I the only person who wonders why Labour MPs who protested against the (non-UN mandated) Serbia campaign to remove Milosevic were an 'absolute disgrace' according to Clare Short, whereas supporting action to overthrow Saddam Hussein is 'utterly reckless'?" - British Spin

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904585052003-03-10T14:56:00.000Z2003-03-10T15:05:59.000Z

An astonishing polling discovery buried by the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy THE GUARDIAN'S FORUMS are an endless source of amusement. I don't necessarily blame the newspaper for this. I am told by internet experts that online forums for all newspapers tend to be filled with the worst sorts of people and the dumbest of debates. But given this, it seems the Guardian forums cater for the most

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904548812003-03-10T13:38:00.000Z2003-03-10T13:52:31.000Z

What explains the Mail's success with the ladies? THE GUARDIAN HAS a long but very interesting profile of the Daily Mail and the paper's attitude to women. Vicious in its sneering at celebrities who have let their figures go, or working women who produce hellraising children, the Mail still manages to win a huge female readership, and is indeed the only national paper to have more female

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904508822003-03-10T11:40:00.000Z2003-03-10T11:55:01.000Z

An easy Anglo-American victory won't make things easy for Blair STEPHEN POLLARD TAKES ISSUE WITH the commonly held view that should Britain emerge victorious from a short and relatively bloodless war with Iraq, Tony Blair will be entirely vindicated, and will be more powerful and dominant than ever. I simply don't buy [this notion], which rests on the supposition that all his party

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904439152003-03-10T07:31:00.000Z2003-03-10T07:33:04.000Z

When it comes to the unborn and abortion, we should err on the side of life and caution SUSAN GREENFIELD, the Oxford Professor and Britain's leading neurologist, has hypothesised that consciousness in the unborn may develop long before we think, and long before the 24 week period allowed for abortion. Her suggestion is that the common perception of consciousness as being 'switched on' at

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904425892003-03-10T06:52:00.001Z2003-03-10T06:52:28.000Z

Clare Short puts her career in Chirac's hands THE MEDIA FURORE over the threatened resignations of a handful of Parliamentary Private Secretaries now seems justified, with Clare Short also promising to resign if a war to liberate Iraq goes ahead without the support of an eighteenth UN resolution. An absurd position, however one looks at it. If a war is unjust, it is unjust with or without

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904425822003-03-10T06:52:00.000Z2003-03-10T06:52:12.890Z

Fewer economic migrants and more genuine refugees would be better for everyone IAIN DUNCAN SMITH has suggested that Britain accept only 20,000 asylum seekers a year. As we currently take in 110,000 with around 90% of them being bogus, this sort of policy would be far better both for people already here, and for the genuine asylum seeker. We would take in fewer people as a whole, but a

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904416242003-03-10T06:26:00.000Z2003-03-10T06:45:11.000Z

Saddam cannot be trusted; the United Nations has failed A FEW INTERESTING COMMENTS in response to yesterday's post on the Second Gulf War. 'James' asks for evidence that Saddam is ready to pass on nuclear weapons to terrorists who threaten us. Well, obviously I cannot yet supply such evidence. But we know that Saddam does fund terrorism and is building a huge arsenal of weapons of mass

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-904379622003-03-10T04:55:00.000Z2003-03-10T05:47:21.000Z

Two cheers for the Caerphilly Labour Party THERE AREN'T MANY parts of the country where Ron Davies' disgusting behaviour would still be condemned, but it seems Caerphilly is still one of them. Their Labour Party has forced his resignation as their Welsh Assembly representative. How sad that it took more than four lie-filled years for this to happen, and that even now it wasn't he who did

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-903865162003-03-09T05:04:00.000Z2003-03-09T05:04:44.966Z

Quote of the Day "War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse." - John Stuart Mill

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-903811152003-03-09T02:45:00.000Z2003-03-09T02:45:43.640Z

If you don't like it, don't steal in the first place DAVID BLUNKETT HAS accepted Oliver Letwin's proposals to make it illegal for burglars to sue their victims for compensation when they trip over a box or the house-holder acts in self-defence or some such situation. Thank God for some common sense now and then.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-903776282003-03-09T01:03:00.000Z2003-03-09T03:46:38.000Z

This war could have been over long ago, but let's at least fight it now LIKE JOHN DERBYSHIRE, Mark Steyn is now simply tired of waiting for the Second Gulf War to begin. A year and a half after calling for Saddam to be toppled, he doubts he's had anything original to say on the matter for months. Now he just waits yet again through further inspections, debate and pointless peacenikkery.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-903757172003-03-09T00:05:00.000Z2003-03-09T00:05:30.043Z

Link of the Week THE LINK OF THIS WEEK is "Euro Not Working" at no-euro.com. For each of the twelve EU member states who have given up their own currencies in favour of the euro, it surveys their economic climate, judging how Maastricht criteria and a common interest rate policy have taken their toll. Very interesting and sobering reading.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-903477812003-03-08T08:22:00.000Z2003-03-08T20:03:45.000Z

Still lost, still paranoid DOES LEFTIST PARANOIA about the Bush Administration know no bounds? I do wonder. Their latest excitement is over the right-of-centre US think tank Project for the New American Century. Its Reaganite agenda of encouraging the spread of American values sounds reasonable enough, and Iain Murray was plain in asking what precisely was so bad about this. American

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-903360842003-03-08T02:59:00.000Z2003-03-08T02:59:29.513Z

Quote of the Day "If Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions." - Abba Eban, Former Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-903099542003-03-07T17:17:00.000Z2003-03-07T17:21:17.000Z

As we put the pressure on Saddam, Al-Qaida is crumbling IN THE SAME WEEK as the arrest of Al-Qaida number three Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, allegedly the man who personally decapitated Daniel Pearl, two of Bin Laden's sons have been captured and nine Al-Qaida terrorists have been killed in a single operation. Can we please now see an end to this myth that by dealing with the threat from rogue

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-902700302003-03-07T00:40:00.000Z2003-03-07T00:44:17.000Z

Inflation at 2%, a pay offer of 16%, and the FBU still says no THE FIRE BRIGADES UNION has now refused a hyper-inflationary pay rise of 16%, despite its ignominious failure to put any pressure on during their strikes through the final months of last year. It seems the Prime Minister was more accurate than we realised in describing Andy Gilchrist as "Scargillite", for Gilchrist has in

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-902569542003-03-06T20:29:00.000Z2003-03-06T20:36:59.000Z

Bush isn't evil, but it's good that the left is so deluded as to think he is A NEW ZEALAND WOMAN shows the mentality of the anti-war brigade with a bizarre offer: her own crucifixion if Bush declines to disarm Saddam by force. If the offer is genuine, it means she really believes that the US President is a psychopath baying for blood, and will accept hers in exchange for Saddam's. It's not

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-902484972003-03-06T17:44:00.001Z2003-03-06T17:44:22.653Z

A Blogger Returns BRITISH SPIN IS BACK! My blog-memory is sadly short, and I can't remember the difference between his views and Harry Steele's, but I do remember British Spin being a very insightful and interesting read. Visit regularly and I'm sure you'll discover the same.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-902484922003-03-06T17:44:00.000Z2003-03-06T17:57:11.000Z

Milburn's right, but do his party know it? I AM NOT a big fan of my MP, the Health Secretary Alan Milburn. He seemed decidedly slimey the couple of times I've met him, and I've heard stories of him being invited to deal with a constituent's problem, rudely putting his feet on their table and then just slouching there disinterested, pretending to write down their complaints. Worse still, in

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-902143552003-03-06T03:14:00.000Z2003-03-06T03:18:49.000Z

Quote of the Day "Justice for Palestine? Be careful what you wish for." - Natalie Solent's enigmatic response to recent news from the Middle East. Think about it.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-902135662003-03-06T03:01:00.000Z2003-03-06T03:08:00.000Z

How Leftist identity politics contributes to anti-Semitism AS PETA - the animal rights group which wrote to Arafat to ask him to stop killing donkeys, though not Jews - displays posters comparing eating animals to the holocaust, Jonah Goldberg suggests reasons why anti-Semitism is so much on the ascent on the Left just as it dies out almost completely on the Right. Obviously,

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901870512003-03-05T18:51:00.000Z2003-03-05T18:59:52.000Z

Quote of the Day "So the people who get drunk in public are not having a good time: they are undergoing therapy. If they didn’t vomit in the street, stagger into the road, scream obscenities at passers-by, have fights with broken bottles, they might do - or even more seriously, suffer - something worse." - Theodore Dalrymple on the permissive attitude that all repression of feelings is

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901861982003-03-05T18:38:00.000Z2003-03-05T18:45:40.000Z

If you have plenty of intelligence, you should be able to see why democracies need the same AS PAUL FOOT condemns the FBI for its sloppiness in arresting innocent British pensioner Derek Bond, whose 21-day ordeal was clearly a disgrace, even if it does not quite merit the levels of media attention given to his release (perhaps rivalled only by that given to Nelson Mandela's). Foot is right

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901845462003-03-05T17:09:00.000Z2003-03-10T07:13:27.000Z

True to form, the BBCdian elite keeps on blaming the victim AS FIFTEEN ISRAELI CIVILIANS are murdered by a Palestinian homocide bomber, the BBCdian elite respond in typical fashion. The Guardian subtlely tries to blame the victims by pointing out in its final paragraph that the atrocity came "days after the establishment of a new rightwing government in Israel". The BBC instead gives a

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901827372003-03-05T16:34:00.000Z2003-03-05T16:36:35.000Z

Blair is listening to the real majority on Iraq CONVINCING NRO COLUMN from Iain Murray on British attitudes to the rest of the world. He looks at opinion polls asking the crucial questions about war with Iraq and the importance of the UN and concludes that ordinary British people were certainly not represented by the Trotskyists and Islamofascists who marched on 15 February, and instead

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901815932003-03-05T16:12:00.000Z2003-03-05T16:18:16.000Z

History and music are not racial, and it is folly to pretend they are THE ONION HAS a fun piece ridiculing the American 'Black History Month', simply by turning all its cliches around and showing how silly and offensive they then sound. As 'White History Year' begins, all Americans remember the contribution whites have made. "Whites have contributed so much to this country," Frist

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901475322003-03-05T01:51:00.000Z2003-03-05T01:53:41.000Z

By calling you "The Enemy Within", I'm being nice - really! AS A LOT of people seem to think the section of my blogroll entitled "The Enemy Within" is intended to be some sort of snub or attack, let me explain. It is not a Nixonian enemies list. It is just a link to weblogs that take a view on politics that I disagree with, but which are nonetheless well worth a look. I use this section to

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901055152003-03-04T10:38:00.000Z2003-03-04T11:15:22.000Z

Calling into question the obvious; affirming the monstrous IN ADDITION TO the justified anger at the Guardian's disgusting Welsh pensioner turns freedom fighter headline, covered so well by Stephen Pollard and his correspondents, it's worth just contrasting that with a report today on the Greek terrorist group November 17. The title to this piece is 'Terror gang' on trial in Athens. So

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-901050802003-03-04T10:21:00.000Z2003-03-04T10:21:11.873Z

Quote of the Day "This is a question of common sense. It used to be said that an Englishman's home is his castle. I do not think that medieval knights used to expect to sue the defendant of castles if they fell off the drawbridge they were invading." - Oliver Letwin on laws allowing burglars to sue their victims if they get injured in their homes

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-900954202003-03-04T05:29:00.000Z2003-03-04T05:49:37.000Z

"Nature must not be sexist! Let's deny sociobiology!" WHEN BASIC SCIENCE comes into conflict with feminist ideology or postmodernist relativism, it loses out just as surely as when it encounters religious fundamentalism. Fact before ideology is just not the way for Zoe Williams. In the Guardian today, she unbelievably dismisses the whole of sociobiology as existing "only to explain why men

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-900870902003-03-04T02:52:00.000Z2003-03-04T03:58:38.000Z

Equal rights for homosexuals does not mean two-man weddings IN A NUMBER of debates on certain other blogs, a few lefties are writing as though it is impossible to support the present marriage laws while also believing that homosexuals should not be treated by law as second class citizens. But the positions are not at all contradictory. No doubt they would argue their case something

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-900599472003-03-03T17:50:00.000Z2003-03-04T03:38:39.000Z

An ode to the Anglosphere THANKS TO ANDREW SULLIVAN for pointing out a well put together music video with a difference, which explores the closeness of the Anglo-American relationship. What it lacks in subtlety and originality it makes up for with humour.

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-900583022003-03-03T17:16:00.000Z2003-03-03T17:23:44.000Z

Evil exists, but not in a form television or its viewers can easily detect VERY INTERESTING COLUMN from Jenny McCartney on the way television makes even the greatest tyrants and monsters seem more human. It's not rational, but it is a real phenomenon. I remember seeing news clips of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, showing the Ayatollah flying home to seize power. Inside the plane, all I saw

_noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3664812.post-900547042003-03-03T16:02:00.000Z2003-03-03T16:02:33.293Z

Quote of the Day "I want people to have a nice life. They don't tell me they have lousy holidays or that they have lousy choice in the supermarkets or they can't get a car they like. They tell me they can't find a road to drive on, they can't find a train to take them where and when they want to go. Some of them are not too happy about the education service, and a lot of them are not too

_noreply@blogger.com