Today’s (20 November 2008) Guardian publishes a letter from me about Lord Bingham’s recent declaration that the attack on Iraq was illegal, and the counter-arguments by Lord Goldsmith, Attorney-General at the time, that it was not. As the edited and published version (perhaps inevitably) omits some of its nuances, here is the original text [...]
In case any reader of this hasn’t already heard it, President-elect Obama’s first weekly address, delivered on 15 November, can be seen and heard on YouTube at
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Zd8f9Zqap6U .
It lasts some three and a half minutes.
It’s also available on The Huffington Post (online newspaper) of 18 November at –
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/15/obama-urges-congress-to-m_n_144035.html
The meatiest part of the extended interview with [...]
Last night was an exciting time to be in New York. Our younger daughter, L, voted in the morning for the first time in an American national election since becoming an American citizen: there were no queues outside the polling station, and inside we watched the orderly line of voters patiently waiting for their turn [...]
An article in today’s Washington Post quotes a distinguished American academic as saying that –
if … the voters pull a Truman [i.e. if McCain-Palin confound the polls and the pundits by winning], that is going to be the end of whatever shred of credibility they have left.
That’s right. If McCain wins after all, we shall [...]
Senator McCain and the Republicans over the water, and the Tories over here, bear-led (the appropriate term in present circumstances) by Cameron, a rather battered Osborne, and Hague, are demanding cuts in government spending — for example, the Tories' advocacy of a freeze on local council spending, and the GOP calling for a freeze in [...]
One or two of Senator McCain's pronouncements on policy issues and other matters during the third and final debate raised some eyebrows.
Healthcare: McCain berates Obama for his proposed compulsory universal healthcare programme, preferring to give everyone a $5,000 tax credit and leaving it to individuals to spend it on health insurance if they feel so [...]
Two things in particular struck me as I watched all 90-odd minutes of the second US presidential debate between Senators McCain and Obama, held last night in Tennessee and available now on the Web (e.g.) here: first, the ever-widening gulf between political perceptions in (most of) the US and in (most of) Europe; and, secondly, [...]
An unsent letter to the Times about mistaken government policy towards Russia and the Georgia conflict, reflecting a consensus among many former British diplomats whose views are scorned by Denis MacShane MP [More >>>]
A cogent article by Sir Ivor Roberts describes how western blunders over Kosovo undermine the case against Russia on Georgia and recommends engaging with Russia, not isolating it [More >>>]
“Richard T” has posted a fascinating comment on my “Kosovo-Georgia Connection” post of 21 August, speculating that the principal motive behind American wooing of Georgia and sponsorship of Georgia for NATO membership may be to secure bases from which US and perhaps Israeli aircraft could attack Iran without needing to overfly any Arab country. This [...]
