Simon Jenkins's Blog, page 127

Alex Ferguson's hairdryer treatment won't cut it in politics | Simon Jenkins

The Manchester United boss has been wildly lauded for his success on the pitch. Those who govern us don't have it so easy

Sorry about the Queen's speech. Sorry about running the country. His royal imperial highness has abdicated and the constitution is in abeyance. Big Ben is in dumb reverence. Ask the public (or its male half) who should rule, the prime minister or Alex Ferguson, and the answer is in unison. Sir Alex wouldn't save the economy with a nudge unit. He'd give it the hairdryer trea...

If David Cameron had any sense, he would call a referendum on Europe now | Simon Jenkins

With Ukip and now Nigel Lawson roaming free, he'll only regain the initiative on Europe if he calls Nick Clegg's bluff

The UK Independence party is mid-term political froth, here today and blown away tomorrow. The only matter of interest is whether it froths enough to destroy a major party leader, David Cameron, as the SDP did Michael Foot in 1983. But if Ukip is froth, yesterday's intervention by Nigel Lawson is a different matter. The former chancellor may be years out of office, but he...

Local elections results: panel verdict

As Ukip makes big gains in local elections across England, our panel discuss what this means for wider politics

Simon Jenkins: A protest vote has acquired backbone

There is no doubt of the victor. The UK Independence party is the new kid on the electoral block and looking good. The key statistic in the local elections is overall poll share. At the time of writing that is one quarter, and it is well distributed, double their performance in the opinion polls.

Ukip showed strongly from South Shield...

Local elections results: panel verdict | The panel

As Ukip makes big gains in local elections across England, our panel discuss what this means for wider politics

Simon Jenkins: A protest vote has acquired backbone

There is no doubt of the victor. The UK Independence party is the new kid on the electoral block and looking good. The key statistic in the local elections is overall poll share. At the time of writing that is one quarter, and it is well distributed, double their performance in the opinion polls.

Ukip showed strongly from South Shield...

From Greenland to Mount Everest, this is the season of reckless jaunts | Simon Jenkins

The quest for risk is part of human nature. It can't be suppressed by bureaucracy or it will resurface elsewhere

A young Briton dies trying to cross Greenland in a blizzard. Another goes missing while trying to sail the Pacific. Three climbers narrowly escape death in a mob fight on Mount Everest. Three sailors plan to pedalo across the Atlantic. That is all inside a week.

Chaucer noted that when April awakens into summer "people long to go on pilgrimages". Nowadays they long to go on reckless...

What Queen Elizabeth can learn from Queen Beatrix | Simon Jenkins

Britain's monarch enjoys huge popular support – but therein lies the royals' vulnerability. They should look to the Netherlands

Today the Queen of the Netherlands, Beatrix, quietly abdicated in favour of her son. The Dutch people took to the streets with Orange joy. There were no republican riots, as there were when she took the throne in 1980. The inauguration of her son, Willem-Alexander, though in a church, took place without religious ceremony. The paraphernalia of monarchy – crowns, orbs...

The European dream is in dire need of a reality check | Simon Jenkins

The EU has lost the support of two thirds of its citizens, yet its leaders won't wake up. It's time for a sceptics' vision of Europe

Voter trust in the EU falls to record low. So proclaimed the front page of today's Guardian. In every one of the big European states, trust has gone into "a vertiginous decline". Five years ago, no country, not even Britain, showed more than half its voters hostile to Europe, and most were strongly supportive. Now, according to the EU's own Eurobarometer, distrus...

If Abenomics works, Britain's leaders will look like monkeys | Simon Jenkins

George Osborne should abandon the tribal morality of austerity and, like Japan, print money not for banks but for people

If you thought Germany was a model modern economy, forget it. Look east. After two decades of self-imposed austerity, Japan has had enough. Its new leaders are systematically, deliberately, massively inflating their economy. Named after the new prime minister, Shinzo Abe, "Abenomics" is now two months into a thundering great plan B.

Japan's central bank has been ordered to...

Must we silence nightingales in order to build houses? | Simon Jenkins

This exquisitely precious bird – nature's composer, conductor and performer in one – is at risk from modern British planning

Wednesday 17 April was not just the day of Lady Thatcher's funeral. The diary gave it as the scheduled arrival date of this year's nightingale migration. How wonderful it would have been if, amid the bells, choirs and organs, this bird of joy had settled in St Paul's churchyard and made the world fall silent.

Two nights before, at the Royal Society of Literature, the nigh...

After the bomb, mass hysteria is the Boston terrorist's greatest weapon | Simon Jenkins

A Chinese proverb bids us ask what the enemy most wants us to do. Boston's bomber craves publicity, reaction and retaliation

I know who the real terrorists are. Some of them set off a bomb during the Boston marathon, killing three people and injuring 176. Such things happen regularly round the world. For those in the wrong place at the wrong time it is a personal catastrophe.

Such deeds are senseless murders, but they are not terrorism as such. What makes them terrorist is the outside worl...