We are stuck with the French phrase coup d’état because nothing else describes so well the sudden removal of an old ruler by secret manoeuvrings — and their replacement with a chosen successor who happens to be endowed with every …
Why we fell for Molly-Mae
In All Bar Ones up and down the country, a silence descended. In the aisles of B&M, in between pyramids of discounted Brazilian Bum Bum Cream, women softly wept. French bulldogs howled in unison from Astroturfed pens on their new-build …
The men who risk everything
Risk for me is an occupational hazard. Why would I film myself running through a front line in eastern Ukraine to a soundtrack of roaring shells and my own cardio-averse panting? (Hint: it’s not the money, trust me.) What would …
The corrupt heart of Japanese politics
In the Nineties, US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and her colleagues made a parlour game of seeing whether anyone could name — in the correct order — all seven of the Japanese prime ministers with whom the Clinton administration …
The No-State Solution
When the guns eventually fall silent in Gaza, Israelis and Palestinians will confront a decades-old reality that cannot be overcome by violence and political half-measures. Both Jews and Palestinians will continue to assert privileged ownership of Palestine, citing centuries of …
The housing crisis tearing Leicester apart
The South Asian neighbourhood of Highfields in Leicester is made up of long, sloping streets of terraced houses, built largely between the Victorian era and the Second World War. At that time, Leicester was a major centre of Britain’s booming …
Putin is no longer Russia’s saviour
At the start of this month, Kyiv’s exhausted forces seemed at last overwhelmed by their opponents’ superiority in manpower and firepower. But once again, they have defied expectations. The Ukrainian Armed Forces’ mass incursion into Russian territory has unfolded at …
Why shouldn’t AI write a film?
“This machine can produce a 5,000-word story, all typed and ready for despatch, in 30 seconds. How can the writers compete with that?” So asks Roald Dahl in his short story The Great Automatic Grammatizator, published in 1953.
The eponymous …
The speech Kamala owes America
In March 2008, in the heat of his campaign for president, Barack Obama suddenly found himself at the edge of an abyss. The former black pastor at his Chicago church, Jeremiah Wright, whom Obama had known for 20 years, was …
Russia’s propaganda machine is failing
Throughout its war against Ukraine, the Kremlin has gone to great lengths to inseparably bind the identities of ordinary Russians to the conflict while also insulating them from its immediate effects. It was always a difficult balancing act, but Ukraine’s …
Musk’s two-tier vision of free speech
According to the feverish visions of some in the US at the moment, England has undergone a radical transformation. Gone are all those entrancingly acerbic dowager duchesses, curtseying maids, wizards and crumpets. Right now, asylum-seeking grooming gangs are roaming the …
Why can’t the Church say ‘church’?
Remember Consignia — that disastrous rebrand of the Post Office? It sounded more like a sexually transmitted disease or an obscure Roman battle than a postal service. The name Royal Mail was apparently too redolent of posties, stamps and letters. …
Macron’s Olympic truce is over
“Paris became a place of celebration once more, and France found itself again.” Tony Estanguet, the president of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games organising committee, could be forgiven for indulging himself during his speech at the weekend’s closing ceremony. Even …
The Republicans’ weird problem predates Vance
Politics has taken an unexpected turn. For decades, weirdness was associated with the Democrats. Excessively concerned with a culture war most Americans don’t care about while remaining captive to parochial subcultures — this used to be the purview of the …
Meet the three types of rioter
Since the first spark was lit in Southport, condemnation of the rioters has largely centred on their identity as “far-Right thugs”. Indeed, some experts, including the former head of British counter-terrorism policing, have gone as far as to call the …