Opinion / British Politics and Society

British/Polish Hypocrisy

Reader Norman Fraser takes me to task for disagreeing with David Aaronovitch: No Charles this will just not do. You are attempting an act of heroic sophistry here and you are clearly not up to it. Quibbling about the words in one article is just not enough. There is too […]

Continue Reading

FCO Lights Out?

Former senior diplomat Sir Christopher Meyer is busy describing what he sees as a decline in the influence and technique of British diplomacy: New Labour’s obsessive reliance on the alchemy of consultants has infected much of Whitehall. The culture of targets, set by the Treasury, has acquired the madness and […]

Continue Reading

Biljana Plavsic – Free Again

Former President of Republika Srpska Biljana Plavsic has left her prison cell in Sweden to return to Belgrade: a land where war criminals are heroes, according to Nenad Pejic: Serbia has been — and continues to be — in a state of denial about the 1990s wars for more than […]

Continue Reading

Coming Out: Charles Crawford, Conservative Party

My various blog posts on the Kaminski story have caught a wider audience. So I have decided today to come out. Back in May this year I, like everyone else, was revolted by the goings-on in Parliament and Government over expenses and other abuses. What especially annoyed me was the […]

Continue Reading

Even Yet More Further Labour Kaminski Nonsense

Update:   Welcome co-conspirators. Guido is on the case. * * * * * The Labour Party are now officially making a total fool of themselves over Michal Kaminski. Young British diplomats are taught that it is poor technique (and, worse, stupid) to quote someone’s words from a magazine without checking that that […]

Continue Reading

A Horror Story

Folks. Drop what you are doing and spend just a few minutes to look at this magnificent, grim tirade from Anna Racccoon on the history and workings of the Court of Protection in England – a creepy and (she asserts) stagnantly dirty and unjust legal backwater inherited from days of […]

Continue Reading

Great Negotiations: Catholics v Anglicans v Muslims

The decision by the Catholic Church to create a formula to allow Anglicans to join the Catholic Church but keep some of their Anglican persona is a stunner. Above all, because it represents the latest move in a Great Negotiation which has proceeded for some 500 years as between Rome […]

Continue Reading

Bracknell Chooses Its Conservative Candidate

As the lugubrious examination of UK MPs and their expenses drags on, the way new Parliamentary candidates are chosen attracts keen interest. The Bracknell constituency has been selecting the Conservative candidate to run for Parliament next time round, using an Open Primary format. Uber-blogger Iain Dale was one of the seven people […]

Continue Reading

Britblog Roundup 244

Is hosted by Liberal England. It links to some howls of denunciation of an undoubtedly unpleasant article in the Daily Mail. Including this nicely tuned sexist analysis from one Clairwil: Consequently the repulsive, fat bitch had to haul her big, lardy, arse back to her keyboard and find some justification for […]

Continue Reading

UN ‘Human Rights Council’: Gaza Vote

A great diplomatic flurrying around the latest vote by the UN Human Rights Council in effect condemning Israel. The resolution passed seems to be this one. The resolution welcomed the earlier Goldstone report which condemned human rights abuses by Israel and Hamas alike. But it also contained a long list of condemnations […]

Continue Reading
Newer EntriesOlder Entries