Shiraz Maher on Contest 2: Contest 2 continues to focus on violent extremism without considering the wider Islamist infrastructure that inspires and motivates terrorism. In practical terms, this means that Contest 2 is largely a continuation of the policy that preceded it, rather than representing a break with the past. The government is still unwilling to

by Diane Abbott, from the Morning Star. This leadership contest is a pivotal moment for the Labour Party. For the first time in 13 years, Labour has been given the opportunity to revamp the party from the top down. It is an offer we must grab with both hands. Not since the 2007 deputy leadership contest

This one is for the political junkies - from the Washington Post - it says: Create your political map and predict the electoral outcome! Think you know politics? Here's your chance to prove it. Pick which candidate will get to 270 electoral votes and you could win the most competitive contest outside the presidential race. Full Contest Rules and Prizes.

This is a guest post by Dilwar Hussain of Policy Research Centre. You have to pity local government and local delivery agencies. Just when everyone was beginning to get their heads around the last strategy for tackling violent extremism unveiled in 2007, along comes a revised version of Contest, the UK Strategy for Countering International Terrorism (or Contest 2). Contest has four pillars to tack...

If there’s going to be a contest could one of these win? With all the focus over the past 24 hours being the growing number of Labour figures calling for a leadership contest the finding of today’s Populus leadership focus group have not merited the attention they perhaps deserve. For the pollster put together a group

In a dispiriting contest, David Miliband looks the best bet to lead the opposition. But there are still grounds for concern that the contest might not result in the rejuvenation that the party needs

The Norwegian entry, which I didn't think was that good, has won the Eurovision song contest with a record number of points. For an anorak like me, it is interesting to see which countries vote for which others in the contest. The system is now supposed to be based on both a phone vote from the population and a 'professional' jury - rather than just phone voting, which was the case last time. Howe...

Why should this be totally in the gift of MP's and the chattering classes? Well we now have the privately educated middle class Guardian columnists who wanted Brown without a contest saying we should now have Johnson without a contest. If Gordon is 'outsted' then surely party members and individual trade unionists should have a say in a real contest rather than th...

More Labour MPs are expected to call for a party leadership contest after a junior minister was sacked for doing so.

Further to my post of yesterday I note that Michael Brown in the Indie, commenting on the possibility of a Labour contest says: 'But whoever wins the party contest would surely have to give a public commitment to hold an early general election. So here again, we see evidence of the belief that any product of a Labour contest to unseat Brown would be 'honour bound by democracy' to ho...