Figures in a Revolution: J-P Marat and Charlotte Corday
Marat dead in his bath after Corday’s visit. From the painting by David. Two of the more interesting minor players in the French Revolution were Jean-Paul Marat (1743 – 93) and Charlotte Corday [...]
The Election campaign 20N
The campaign: a low blow from the CIS With nearly 4 months to go before the general election, the two major parties are beavering away in the political river. The PSOE is building a dam [...]
Right, Left and Right again
Norway, a small rich country of some six million inhabitants, was among the worst sufferers of Nazi invasion and subsequent occupation during the Second World War. Larger, more populous northern states like Finland, Sweden and [...]
Politics
‘Politics’ is an English plural noun, which can correctly be used with a singular or plural verb, though in the Noughties it has mostly been accompanied by a singular verb. It is the science or [...]
Watergate
Nixon not playing the flute / handresearch.com This American scandal rocked the Presidency until it toppled, as well as adding an over-used suffix to almost anything journalists wish to give a reverberating name [...]
The dangers inherent in being a Bishop
Henry Scrope discusses a point with Lord Chief Justice Gascoigne / commons.wikimedia.org English history is packed with characters rather like a sardine can is stuffed with sardines. Many of these suffocating persons wore [...]
120 kph/110 kph/120 kph
Just about the last ‘reform’ ordered by Mr. Pérez R. as Minister of the Interior was the return of the maximum speed limit on Spanish main roads and autoways to 120 kmh. The limit had [...]
A Modest Proposal for Cataluña
Cataluña, with its great port of Barcelona as the hub, has always been a region (or community) known for diligence, hard work, initiative and brains. It used to form part of the Kingdom of Aragon, [...]
Goosepimples
The Great Magistrate Pascual Sala, president of a politically correct invention called The Constitutional Court, recently found national reaction to his tribunal’s latest comedy ‘frightening’. It gave him ‘goosepimples’, he said. He was referring to [...]
M. Strauss Kahn
Strauss-Khan stressed / thetimes.co.uk News from New York suggests that the former Director of the IMF may not have tried to rape a hotel employee. It adds that M. Strauss-Khan may have fallen [...]
Supreme and Constitutional
Next year the general election in Spain will choose which of the two major political parties will struggle on for another four years; the economy in ruins, the unemployment figures spiralling upwards, confidence in local [...]
GM and BM in the 21st century
Good manners are the means by which we become and remain civilized in a far from civilized world. Good manners have nothing to do with ‘class’ or ‘Society’ or what Miss Mitford agreed was ‘U’ [...]
The Swastika and the Clenched Fist
The swastike, a borrowed symbol / hindugodwallpaper.com Believe it or not, the word comes from the Sanskrit svastika, and the nearest translation would be ‘conducive to well-being’. The swastika is an ancient emblem, [...]
The (almost) Black and Tans in Ireland
Some ‘Black and Tans’ / puesoccurrences.wordpress.com With the open admission that there has always been conflict between Ireland and England, probably since the Dark Ages, it was noted in the 1920s that ‘Irish [...]
Philip Duke of Edinburgh
The Duke hits Ninety The Queen’s consort of six decades is 90. He has had what he calls ‘a good innings’. He is very popular with many in European countries, and the United States. He [...]
Who replaces Strauss-Khan in France?
Since the ex-Head of the IMF has been disgraced for not keeping himself under control in a New York hotel suite, the question of who French socialists can promote as their candidate in next year’s [...]
Spain: Pyrrhic Victories
In Spain the regional community, town hall and city mayoral elections were recently celebated right across the country. It would be true to say that the elections again prove that Spain must radically reform her [...]
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