World
Tim Walz’s Minnesota vibes
The first thing a Minnesota political activist tells me when I ask about Tim Walz is this: when he gets…
What does Appalachia mean?
The selection of J.D. Vance as Donald Trump’s running mate has made Appalachia the regional epicenter of America’s political universe.…
The pro-life problem
The pro-life movement has reason to be grateful to Donald Trump, even as it has reason to feel exasperated as…
Israel is turning its sights on Hezbollah
As its Gaza campaign cools, Israel’s attention is returning northwards. Approximately 60,000 Israelis from northern communities are still refugees. A…
Is Keir Starmer serious about reforming the NHS?
Does Keir Starmer want to use Lord Darzi’s report on the NHS today merely as the latest ‘shocking’ piece of…
My parental lobotomy
On August 25, 1953, neurosurgeon William Beecher Scoville drilled holes into the skull of a young epileptic named Henry Gustav…
The thrill of being recognized
I had just left Tate Britain and was heading toward the Pimlico underground station when I noticed an attractive woman…
A matter of presidents
Virginia spawned four of the first five US presidents. Between Reconstruction and the roaring twenties, Ohio’s executive fecundity earned it…
The Basement Government
The last presidential election was one in which the term “popular front” took on new meaning owing to the Covid…
Eighty years on, Smokey Bear has aged like a fine oak
On a muggy mid-morning in early August, I arrived at the Berks County (Pennsylvania) Heritage Center to celebrate the birthday…
Mick Lynch blasted for ‘bonkers’ pro-Palestine comments
To the Trades Union Congress conference, where Mick Lynch is once again at the centre of political controversy. The RMT…
The return of CRT TVs
Cathode-ray televisions — the thick, “fat” CRT TVs of my youth — were dead. You couldn’t find them in secondhand…
Falling in love with Montana
“You have a big mountain to climb!” is not the sort of text you eagerly await from your girlfriend’s father.…
The real reason the Treasury can’t find the fiscal ‘black hole’
The Chancellor was so shocked when she received the briefings from Treasury officials that she had no choice but to…
This report is a damning indictment of the NHS
Lord Darzi had only nine weeks to conduct his investigation into and assessment of the National Health Service. But this…
The vision behind Woolsery
At first glance, it looks like any other sleepy village in southwest England. A medieval church and manor house face…
Rwanda to Uganda: a cross-border quest
The shelves of my father’s study-cum-Tottenham Hotspur shrine, stacked with leatherbound match day programs and soccer players’ autobiographies, belie his…
Culling cookbooks
How do you choose ten cookbooks out of more than a hundred collected over sixty years? With difficulty. After my…
In praise of Halloween food
If you’re hesitant to ask someone if they are American or Canadian — the latter are often offended to be…
Kombucha future: my scoby is taking over my life
I once read the back cover of a book with a brilliant premise: a Silicon Valley wage-slave with a dull,…
Prosecco goes posh
Compromises are odious. They reek of disappointments both large and small, when no one really gets his way — there’s…
Shaking up the mojito
Barmen despise making mojitos. The descendant of various Caribbean rum-based cocktails, they only became truly popular in the early 2000s.…
Portuguese wines are back
Regular readers will recall my fondness for Lord Falkland’s observation that “when it is not necessary to change, it is…
What I learned from my time in Taiwan
When hearing “Taiwan,” people who have some awareness of the world will think of its focal role in US-China relations…
What the BBC gets wrong about the Gaza conflict
This week, the BBC was accused of breaching its own editorial guidelines on more than 1,500 occasions and displaying a…
