It's amazing how rich you can get in a democracy where lese majesty is still a crime, provided you are da majesty. King Bhumibol is the world's richest monarch. Crown holdings include slum housing, cement, shopping malls, insurance and the...

Why don't [union leaders] be selective and call out only those members who can cause damage to the government? There are places in the public sector that could go on strike for years and it would make little difference." - Letter in the New Statesman, 12 December 2011 Assuming the unions were to agree with that—which I suspect they dare not, and is indeed one strategic reason why one-da...

Absolutely brutal. A reporter from Jon Stewart's Daily Show visits the Occupy Wall Street encampment and finds major class divisions in 'Da Movement' Classic - a guy who condemns private property refuses to allow "those shiftless hobos down in Bum-Town" use his iPad, because that's personal property. But he's against private property, AKA stuff that belongs to other people...

The National’s blockbuster show of the Renaissance master’s paintings is a great tribute to human genius and creativity.

Portuguese MEP Maria da Graça Carvalho (European People's Party) is calling for more structural funds to be used for research in a new report to be discussed at a Parliamentary workshop later this month. She is a firm believer that Europe needs to spend more on science and research to emerge from its current economic malaise. More »

United States Supreme Court Rejects Appeal from Philadelphia DA’s Office (New York, NY) — On 11th October, the United States Supreme Court rejected a request from the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office to overturn the most recent federal appeals court decision declaring Mumia Abu-Jamal’s death sentence unconstitutional. The Court’s decision brings to an...

Yes, apparently, it's a Mob of No Appearance, with absolutely no defining characteristics whatsoever, although it's certain they were provoked into by da cutz. Hey, I'm not an economist, but I'm pretty sure shooting gunmen is pretty much fiscally neutral. Still, let's check the scorecard here: two references to her work in 1500 pages prove Melanie Phillips caused the Oslo massacre, but there's no ...

Reinaldo da Silva, the boyfriend of Lord Mandelson, the former business secretary, has taken on a directorship in his lover's company.

My friend Matthew is fond of quoting the legendary Manchester Guardian critic Neville Cardus, who never took tea with the notional enemy because "to do so would be to dilute the purity of my hatred". Neville Cardus, eh? Who'da thunk...

There are no areas of the economy off limits to the so-called Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA), and such is their zeal that they have another spin-off, the Drivers’ Alliance (DA), to help spread their particular brand of propaganda on matters relating to road transport and travel. They have published a so-called “research note” titled “Speeding Fines” [.pdf], with such...