tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-56535172008-06-22T21:02:55.852-07:00Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1164160546975166732006-11-21T17:45:00.000-08:002006-11-21T17:56:47.636-08:00

Click here to read the full text of the 2006 Philip Geddes Memorial Lecture, given by Spectator editor Matthew d'Ancona on October 27th at the Examination Schools, Oxford.

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1161934779486691822006-10-27T00:38:00.000-07:002006-11-09T02:13:09.716-08:00

Environmental polemicist George Monbiot's new book asks why people do not act on their fears of climate change. Good question. James Heartfield Heat: how to stop the planet burning, supported by its accompanying website www.turnuptheheat.org, demands to know why the very people that are committed to saving the environment are doing most to destroying it. Guardian columnist George Monbiot

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1161756386528215222006-10-24T23:05:00.000-07:002006-10-24T23:06:46.526-07:00

It is scandalous that doctors are refusing treatment to patients who smoke, drink or eat junk food. Rob Lyons Doctors in the UK, prompted by policy changes by government, are increasingly refusing to treat patients because they smoke, drink or weigh too much. Who the hell do they think they are? In the latest example of this trend, health chiefs in Norfolk and Newcastle-under-Lyme have decided

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1161745700508986072006-10-24T20:07:00.000-07:002006-10-24T20:12:36.200-07:00

By Sam Harris | October 22, 2006 THE MIDTERM elections are fast approaching, and their outcome could well be determined by the ``moral values" of conservative Christians. While this possibility is regularly bemoaned by liberals, the link between religion and morality in our public life is almost never questioned. One of the most common justifications one hears for religious faith, from all

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1160522650864452042006-10-10T16:20:00.000-07:002006-10-10T16:33:06.413-07:00

By Mark Helprin This essay will appear in the Fall 2006 issue of the Claremont Review of Books. Imagine an Israeli guerrilla organization based in the Galilee, a power unto itself, with seats in the cabinet, a generous welfare apparatus, and the oft-stated goal of Lebanon's destruction and replacement with a Jewish state governed by Jewish religious law. Upon instructions from its foreign

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1125873363466352942005-09-04T15:23:00.000-07:002005-09-04T15:36:03.480-07:00

Some of the commentary almost seems to be rubbing its hands in "we-told-you-so" glee. by Mick Hume The sea of effluent running through the streets of New Orleans this week has been accompanied by some equally putrid propaganda from those who try to seize on any disaster as proof of the rotten state of humanity - and of its American branch in particular. Those who insist that Hurricane Katrina

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1124932445689057942005-08-24T18:02:00.000-07:002005-08-24T18:45:06.903-07:00

So what if astronauts can glimpse signs of man's impact on Earth? by Sandy Starr Two cheers for NASA on the return of its space shuttle Discovery to Earth, mostly intact and with its crew alive and well. One cheer is deducted, partly because - as has been argued elsewhere on spiked - the mission was a glorified 'grocery-delivery trip to the International Space Station' (see

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1121382666447746052005-07-14T16:08:00.000-07:002005-07-14T16:12:01.730-07:00

What the genocide taught us about intervention. By Christopher Hitchens Ten years since the hecatomb of Srebrenica … surely a decade cannot have passed so quickly? It really feels to me like yesterday. I can hear Susan Sontag's exact tone of voice as she described being in a ministerial office in Sarajevo when the mayor of Srebrenica got through on a bad line to say, "This is goodbye." He did

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1119475401119138822005-06-22T14:22:00.000-07:002005-06-22T14:24:25.500-07:00

If you liked The Da Vinci Code, you'll love the Downing Street Memo. By Christopher Hitchens Posted Tuesday, June 21, 2005, at 9:42 AM PT A few weeks ago, at an airport in Europe, I saw Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code staring at me across the bookstore bins. I had seen it many times before and averted my gaze, but I was facing a long delay, and I suddenly thought: May as well get it over with. Well,

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1117343325730244862005-05-28T22:07:00.000-07:002005-05-28T22:11:36.890-07:00

Stop the Masochistic Insanity The violent response to the report of "Quranic abuse" isn't about faith, it's about intolerance. By Christopher Hitchens Posted Monday, May 23, 2005, at 9:16 AM PT Toward the end of Taliban rule in Afghanistan, when music had already been banned and women excluded from Islamic rituals by being immured in their homes, and when new non-Quranic punishments—such as

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1116309792475266082005-05-16T22:57:00.000-07:002005-05-28T22:12:55.940-07:00

Why does the New York Times insist on calling jihadists "insurgents"? By Christopher Hitchens Posted Monday, May 16, 2005, at 10:09 AM PT When the New York Times scratches its head, get ready for total baldness as you tear out your hair. A doozy classic led the "Week in Review" section on Sunday. Portentously headed "The Mystery of the Insurgency," the article rubbed its eyes at the sheer lunacy

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1111228687694009872005-03-19T02:37:00.000-08:002005-03-19T02:38:07.700-08:00

We should not ask whether the Iraq invasion was 'legal' - we should ask whether it was 'good' David Aaronovitch Sunday March 6, 2005 Observer Last week's jilbab decision left me wondering whether the law was always this important. Wasn't there a time when schools could take decisions about the uniforms their pupils should wear without a judge having the final say? I see the advantages of greater

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1110147749771292762005-03-06T14:20:00.000-08:002005-03-06T15:53:44.623-08:00

by Christopher Hitchens The return of politics to Iraq has had many blissful secondary consequences, one of them apparently minor but nonetheless, I think, important. When was the last time you heard some glib pundit employing the phrase "The Arab Street"? I haven't actually done a Nexis search on this, but my strong impression is that the term has been, without any formal interment, laid to

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1109582483874419022005-02-28T01:20:00.000-08:002005-02-28T01:21:23.906-08:00

By Paula Bourges Waldegg It’s not hard to accept that there’s a pressing need to find answers for the questions that issues such as cloning, pollution, or genetic manipulation entail. However, it is difficult to agree which are these questions and their possible answers because the debate is often driven by the naturalistic fallacy, the belief that nature is essentially good. The environmentalist

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5653517.post-1109581479094268302005-02-28T01:03:00.000-08:002005-02-28T01:14:57.056-08:00

By Edmund Standing In debates about sexuality, ‘nature’ is invariably brought into the discussion, and usually all the participants involved will try to claim that nature supports their position. Why? What if nature isn’t our best guide at all? We live most of our lives in a constant process of negating the base realities of nature, yet when it comes to sex we suddenly think nature has all the

Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13278256717397602065noreply@blogger.com