Here in powerful fluent form is Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski, speaking today in Berlin about Europe and the Eurozone. If anyone can find a better peacetime speech by any Polish Foreign Minister or any Polish politician ever, let it be produced! Not that it is perfect. Too many rather […]
Former FCO Minister Denis MacShane MP has written a small but energetic book praising Kosovo’s independence: Why Kosovo Still Matters (sic). Here it is, a perfect Christmas stocking-filler, the more perfect if bought via this link so that I get a few groats from Amazon: The main interest of the book for […]
We mere taxpayers suspect in our dark hearts that a formidable industry has grown up around the ‘climate change’ issue, with all sorts of organisations big and small depending on state handouts to survive, and so frothing up the climate issue regardless of the facts to make sure that those handouts […]
As readers here know, the Spiegel Online site is a fine way to find thoughtful pieces on the goings-on in Europe from a German perspective. Try these two for size. The first is an interview with Polish Central Bank Governor Marek Belka (who served for a while as a technocrat Prime Minister […]
Hurrah! You can fight back against burglars in England (as long as you act ‘instinctively’). So proclaims Minister of Justice Ken Clarke: In an historic move, Justice Secretary Ken Clarke yesterday announced a major strengthening of the rights of victims standing up to intruders in their property. It means anyone who […]
Update it is sobering to see a long line of comments after such an article in a national newspaper, many of them buzzing away about issues far from the immediate points I made. Lots of not altogether focused Euro-scepticism out there. But this one from damage124 caught my amused eye: Unless […]
Wearing my ADRg Ambassadors hat I was in London on Tuesday to give a workshop to a prominent law firm on The Psychology of Negotiation. The people who attended spend much of their time drafting the legal clauses needed to give effect to deals already done or in prospect. They nonetheless […]
In 1969, in her seminal work On Death and Dying, Elisabeth Kubler-Ross eloquently detailed the five stages of dying – denial, anger, bargaining, depression and finally, acceptance. It remains one of the most important contributions to our understanding of the final phase of life and will do much to explain […]
How many times do I need to argue that the ‘basic’ problem with the European Union is a failure to accept certain Realities? If you’re sick of hearing it from me, as well you might be, listen to John Kay over at the FT (Note: it’s painful to pay (horror) for […]
Walter Russell Mead pours out one fine article after another. Look at his blunt observations on the desperate situation in Rhode Island where years of not decades of public sector greed and a refusal by politicians and unions there to accept underlying financial realities (especially for pensions) is creating a […]
