Open Season
Third Time Unlucky
“We should never trust the government — any government — to look after us in old age”
Snakes In The Grass
‘Trigger warnings are not merely tools for censoring febrile material for the few, but a complaint about the dominance of Western thought’
Wrong And Hateful; Brave And Right
‘The depiction of Muhammad is a test case for the practice of Western freedoms’
Lee’s Legacy
“Lee Kuan Yew met every Chinese leader from Mao to Xi Jinping. But is China following his Singaporean model?”
What’s In A Boy’s Name?
‘Even high-profile women who assume their husband’s name on marriage, like the human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, are loudly criticised’
Scrap The DCMS
“The Department for Culture, Media and Sport has done much harm and little good to the state of British arts.”
The Importance of Individual Choice
“My choice to study here aged 17 with very little spoken English could have been a disaster”
Memorable Memoirs
‘The best political memoirs are shot through with a kind of candour’
History Repeats
‘Policymakers should recall that there have been intolerant Muslim movements in the past’
The Scientific State
The state is crowding out private funding of scientific research
Why Remoaners should back Boris
“Boris, ironically, now offers Remoaners the best chance of a soft Brexit, or at least a sensible one. And to those who want a second referendum—’the people’s vote’—there may even be a chance of that too.”
On the road
“In the summer of 1980, in the grip of some Kerouac-ish fantasy, I opted to hitch-hike from Laredo to New York”
Discovering the Great War of China
A third of a million Chinese labourers helped the Allies defeat the Kaiser, but their huge unsung contribution ended in betrayal