I've just been listening to a radio programme about the broadcaster and philosopher Bryan Magee. He's been blogged about here several times, and I collected most of what I had to say in a post I wrote after he died in 2019. Most notably, he introduced me to the work of Karl Popper and was evacuated to Market Harborough as a boy during the war. Magee's television series Men of Ideas, in which he interviewed contemporary philosophers about the ideas of the subject's great figures, was broadcast in 1978. (I suspect Angie Hobbs, who made the programme, is younger then ...
The latest edition of my weekly political polling round-up, The Week in Polls, is out. As it says: A popular piece doing the rounds in the last week or two is from Anton Howes about the frailty of history knowledge, highlighting how rarely sources cited by historians are checked and how often, when they are, problems are found... I had a similar experience when writing my book about political polling and looking at the record of George Gallup. Find out more by reading this edition of The Week in Polls here, and you can sign up below to receive future ...
Arts Fresco, Market Harborough's annual street theatre festival, took place today. It was hot, and the crowd and the number of acts seemed lower than in its glory days of a few years ago, but it was still great fun.
Back in March I wrote a blog about the Ukraine – Russia war in which I stated that Russia had made a big mistake in invading Ukraine and that eventually this would backfire on Russia spectacularly. While the current regime in Russia persists, my prediction came close to coming true, with the abortive coup by ... Continue reading Russia & Ukraine – what next?
The ALTER (libdemsalter.org.uk) fringe at Bournemouth will be held from 13.00 in the Sherborne Suite, Bournemouth Marriott Highcliff Hotel on Saturday 23rd September 2023. The fringe is focused on the white paper published by the News | Albright Stonebridge Group that asserts Land Value Capture can finance Ukraine's reconstruction, reduce corruption and boost productivity. The white paper notes the following key takeaways: • A broad consensus of economists throughout history have supported land value capture - collecting the increase in land value that results from public spending on infrastructure and other services - as the optimal method of financing public ...
As if it was not bad enough that we have cut ourselves off from our biggest market and alienated half the world by refusing to deliver on our treaty obligations on asylum, it seems that this Tory government is working to find other ways to isolate the country and turn us into international pariahs. The Guardian reports that Rishi Sunak was warned that he faced exclusion from key discussions on the climate among world leaders at the UN before he decided to snub a global summit later this month. The paper says that when the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, called ...
This is the final track on Carly Simon's No Secrets, an LP I love perhaps more than it deserves because, along with Paul Simon's One Trick Pony, it reminds me of my first days in my own house. I'm inclined to write it off as a typical final track, in that it has things a little too pat, but an article by Mark Leviton takes it seriously: Fortunately, the set concludes with another winner, 'When You Close Your Eyes,' co-written with Billy Mernit, a musical jack-of-many-trades who also met Simon in the Berkshires. Mernit, who claims he supplied the 'clouds ...
Dundee Art Society's free monthly artists talks are back after our summer break and the first speaker will be Russell Pepper from Dundee's own Open/Close. Russell will talk about "Murals and Street Art of Dundee". It is taking place this Friday - 15th September - from 7pm to 9pm at the Roseangle Gallery All welcome - doors open 6.45pm!
