So farewell, then Peter Sarstedt. “Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)”. That was Your song. So where Did You Go To My Lovely? © E. J. Throbb, aged 17¾ ...Read More...

To paraphrase John Cleese’s harried headmaster in the film Clockwise, I could take the despair. It was the hope I couldn’t stand. It was the evening of June 23, 2016 – yes, I know it’s been a long time since I posted – and I had gathered with a small group of those rare birds, North London Brexiteers, for ...Read More...

Remember the much ballyhooed Leytonstone Koranic expert, who shouted at a suspected terrorist during a stabbing at a tube station "You ain't no Muslim, bruv"? Because no true Muslim would kill anyone in the name of Allah, would they? From The Telegraph: A popular shopkeeper was stabbed to death by ...Read More...

The first shall be last, said Jesus. He obviously hadn't checked his privilege. Michael Deacon in The Telegraph: Good news and bad news for gay men. The good news is: congratulations! You are officially no longer oppressed. The bad news is: you’re now the oppressors. Or so I gather from the ...Read More...

Many years ago, in the pre-satnav era, a colleague told me of his success in the Advanced Driving Test. As an "Advanced Motorist" he would be able to negotiate a discount on his car insurance. Did I fancy it? I asked what it entailed. "Finding your way to somewhere by following the road signs," he said. ...Read More...

From Charles Moore in this week's Spectator: I have read a good many pieces by Labour supporters wringing their hands about Labour’s growing anti-semitism. Not one of them has contained the one word which is the key to this matter — Muslims. Yup.  ...Read More...

Boris, Brexiteer in Chief, takes issue with Obama, who would lump us in with the Remains. From The Telegraph: In two global conflicts, and throughout the Cold War, the United States has fought for the founding ideals of the republic: that government of the people, by the people, for the people should ...Read More...

The Telegraph's Allison Pearson writes: Anyone who has stopped to look at a carpet in Turkey knows how it goes. First, the crazy opening price. You shake your head and walk away. Ahmet coaxes you into his shop with smiles and voluble assurances: “Byooutiful lady, pliiss, I give you verrayy gud prayce!” Then, ...Read More...

What would they do without North Korean curtain and wall material?   ...Read More...

Christopher Howse chews the [email protected] in today's Telegraph: The most annoying department of arithmetic when I was a little boy was called practice. If I had known that practice had another meaning, “deception”, I would have found the name right and just, for the whole subject seemed to be trial and error ...Read More...

David Thompson writes: From the New York Times, Jennifer Medina on sex education for teenagers: Consent from the person you are kissing — or more — is not merely silence or a lack of protest, Shafia Zaloom, a health educator at the Urban School of San Francisco, told the students. They listened ...Read More...

Recently I asked after a friend's seventeen-year-old daughter. "Oh, she's gay again." "Again? You mean she was gay and went straight for a bit and thought better of it. So she's bisexual?" "No, it doesn't work like that anymore. Young people aren't one or the other or a bit of both like in our day. ...Read More...

Spare a thought for the suffering soldier of Allah. From The Telegraph: A British jihadist with Isil has moaned that his Arab comrades are rude, do not know how to queue and eat like schoolchildren. In a bizarre rant, Omar Hussain also complained that his fellow terrorists talk loudly when ...Read More...

Nobody could accuse the urbane, cultivated and mild-mannered Charles Moore of being extreme. His piece on Islam in The Telegraph is so gentle and understated, he should be re-christened "Charles Less", Still, some good points, and carries force because Moore has overcome an initial reluctance to see ...Read More...

A few days before the UK General Election, Ayann Hirsi Ali hoped for a Conservative victory. From The Times: On Mr Cameron’s watch, websites promoting Islamic extremism have been targeted and hate preachers kept out or kicked out of the country. The charity commission has also been given new powers ...Read More...

Islam is not original. Mohammed looted and abused stories from Judaism and Christianity, just as he and his cronies looted and abused women and other chattels from caravans. So if it isn't original, is it nothing? There is certainly an emptiness at the heart of Islam. Indeed it is: "dull, dull, dull. ...Read More...

Islamisation of London proceeds apace - even the Old Lady of Threadneedle Street is sporting a burkha: ...Read More...

Just two small errata in Allison Pearson's excellent Telegraph article: If you chose to look, if you stiffened your nerve, you could see two men being burnt alive this week. The first was in England. He was tethered at the centre of a wigwam of stakes. The night before his execution, James Baynham ...Read More...

Rod Liddle: They have been burning churches and murdering Christians again in Niger. You’d think that they’d have more immediately pressing concerns than worrying about a cartoon, Niger regularly winning the award for being the worst country anywhere on God’s earth, and the poorest. But nope, it’s ...Read More...

Jack London doesn't seem to be much read these days, at least not in London. I like his short story "To Build a Fire", which is exactly the right length - he obviously spent long enough on it to make it short enough. Unusually, a film of the story is the right length too. It isn't often you see a ...Read More...

So farewell, then, Demise Demis Roussos. We thought you'd go On forever. And ever. And ever And ... And Deirdre from Coronation Street. "I don't want to go," she Told Ken. But she went And another one. Mandy Rice-Davies. She died. Well, she would Wouldn't she? And Jeremy Thorpe's Corpse And ...Read More...