If politics is showbusiness for the ugly, then party conference season is their Oscars. It was tempting to stand on the side-lines of the carpeted entrance of Liverpool’s convention centre and shout “Who are you wearing?” as successive cabinet ministers …
Labour conference can only get better
It wasn’t meant to be like this. This was meant to be a victory lap during a honeymoon period on the banks of Liverpool’s River Mersey. It was meant to be Things Can Only Get Better, but it has the …
Beware the weather gods
I drove home at midnight on Saturday through thunder and lightning, that stretched from horizon to horizon like a scene from the end of the world. The mood was made eerier by having eaten dinner outdoors, a scant few miles …
Can Trump flip the unions?
The thick-necked union boss, who’s short on manners and long on tough talk and machismo, is in many ways an endangered American archetype. Amid rampant political correctness and professionalisation, they seem like anachronisms from a lost age; Sean O’Brien, president …
Starmer’s relaunch was cursed
It is a rare curse for a government to be forced to relaunch so soon after entering power. Yet with the Labour Party and its leader currently exploring new depths of unpopularity, the explicit aim of Starmer’s speech to conference …
The two women who define Trump
One is loud, the other quiet. One is crude and unfiltered, the other reserved and prim. One courts controversy at every turn, the other mostly shuns it. One is a Donald Trump-seeking missile; the other seems to have as little …
What will replace Hezbollah?
In the summer of 2019, I took one of Beirut’s vintage Mercedes taxis to the city’s southern suburbs. I was in Dahieh to meet Lokman Slim, a prominent Lebanese researcher and fierce critic of Hezbollah. Slim, together with his German-born …
Sally Rooney’s therapy trap
If you’ve ever had the curious pleasure of reading a Sally Rooney novel, you may guess what you’re in for with Intermezzo. There will be endless intimate descriptions of the psychology and behaviour of her characters; sex scenes full of …
Has Sahra Wagenknecht already peaked?
Yesterday, as the dust settled on another regional election in East Germany, commentators were quick to highlight yet another strong performance by the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW). In Brandenburg, the Left-populist upstart secured 13% of the vote — which was …
The folly of America First
In his 2017 inauguration speech, Donald Trump made a vow to the American people: “A new vision will govern our land, from this day forward, it’s going to be only America first.” Every decision on trade, taxes and foreign affairs, …
The Left is coming for Starmer
As Labour gather in Liverpool, in an attempt to regain some moral credibility after a dire first few months in power, a storm is gathering on Starmer’s Left. For now it lacks the media spotlight of donor-funded birthday parties and …
Why girls should be tomboys
In my late teens, I went from being very girly to very boyish. After being intensely feminine during high school — skirts, makeup, boy band crushes — I adopted a new identity. I was a tomboy. My hair was buzzed …
Nuclear horror still haunts us
On 13 September, Vladimir Putin issued a sobering threat. If Ukraine used Nato-supplied missiles against targets deep inside Russia, the president warned, the alliance would be “directly participating in the conflict” — and the US and its allies would be …
Sue Gray’s deadly grip on Starmer
It should not be this bad, this early. Nowhere near. And yet it is — it really is. For the Labour Party, barely two months into government, preparing for conference, it is time to panic.
While there is an understandable …
How political violence lost its power
Barely 24 hours after an armed man was found within several hundred yards of Donald Trump on his golf course in Florida, my local newspaper ran a piece with the following headline: “Would-be assassin soured on Trump: Who did he …