Simon Jenkins's Blog, page 95

Bombing is immoral, stupid and never wins wars. Syria is the latest victim | Simon Jenkins

Despite thousands of innocent deaths, the use of drones has done nothing to halt the Taliban or al-Qaida. If David Cameron must intervene in Syria, ground troops are the only course

The British government will shortly ask parliament to approve its sixth war of overseas intervention in just two decades. The victim will be Syria. Such a war is incoherent. The “enemy” appears to be both sides in a civil war – Islamic State and the Syrian regime.

Related: Russia sends artillery and tanks to Syria...

Why Jeremy Corbyn’s wait-and-see stance on EU membership makes sense | Simon Jenkins

David Cameron has promised fundamental reforms – but until that’s clear the Labour leader has reserved judgment on the referendum. At least this continues debate for a divided electorate

The bizarre Corbyn interregnum at chateau Labour could yet prove salutary. The new leader’s position on the EU referendum is the only one that makes sense – other than Ukip’s. It is a refusal to decide for or against continued British membership of the EU until we know what that really means.

Related: Those wh...

If this is the best Britain can do for refugees, it’s sickening | Simon Jenkins

For someone who trumpeted the ‘big society’, David Cameron knows little of charity on the ground

Britons hate immigrants; Britons need immigrants. History has resolved this paradox through occasional charitable outbursts, when the country’s natural defences are besieged by desperate people seeking shelter. Charity conquers aversion, and the nation has always grown stronger in consequence.

The European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, welcomed the fact today that Europe was currently s...

Cameron justifies the drone strike in Syria: is this his WMD moment? | Simon Jenkins

British Isis fighters are killed in an unprecedented attack. The prime minister’s explanation smacks of Tony Blair’s rationalisation of military action in Iraq

It sounded good, but did it sound right? David Cameron’s Commons explanation of the killing of three Britons in Syria eerily recalled Tony Blair on the Iraq war, that Saddam Hussein had “weapons of mass destruction” that posed “an imminent threat” to British national security.

Related: UK forces kill British Isis fighters in targeted dr...

To Farage the opportunist, the EU referendum is his chance for glory | Simon Jenkins

Britain’s membership of the EU is essentially about immigration, according to Ukip, so what better time for Farage to assert that we should go it alone?

The phoenix rises from the ashes. Nigel Farage’s Ukip today became the third army to join the crusade for Britain to leave Europe in the 2017 referendum. Why he should do so is hardly a secret: Farage is a master opportunist. The refugee crisis has plunged Europe into a turmoil of confusion over migration. To Farage, Britain’s membership of th...

Labour has outstanding leaders. It’s a shame that they are all in the regions | Simon Jenkins

There is a clear way for the Labour party to progress; it must open up its primaries to talented regional politicians

Who is really powerful in the British Labour party? Who wins votes, decides policies, commands budgets, doles out jobs? Who knows how to run something?

I tell you the answer.It is people such as Richard Leese, Nick Forbes, Judith Blake, Albert Bore, Julie Dore, Peter Soulsby, Jules Pipe and Robin Wales. You have probably never heard of them, because you think important politics...

Our lust for Chinese investment has caught us out, Ashley Madison-style | Simon Jenkins

Sneaking off to China to beg for political investment in vanity projects that no European would touch is no route to economic recovery

China was always the Ashley Madison of public money. Finance ministers with an infrastructure problem would sneak off to Beijing for a quickie billion and return with smiles on their faces. The Chinese seemed willing and no one need know. George Osborne and David Cameron have done it for HS2 and Hinkley Point. Boris Johnson can’t keep his hands off Chinese skys...

We are slaves to the printed word, but only handwriting conveys real beauty | Simon Jenkins

The curriculum downgrades cursive writing. But the pen can communicate meaning lost on a screen

When did you last write a letter, that is really “write” one? I still struggle to handcraft thank-yous and letters of congratulation or commiseration. I take reporting notes and scrawl messages, but often cannot decipher the result. My speed-writing has long gone and I cannot imagine my fingers surviving a student essay. A page of sustained writing is a calligraphic car crash.

Related: Signing off:...

The answer to drugs in athletics? Have two races: doped and clean | Simon Jenkins

Performance drugs seem rife among athletes. Let’s all stop pretending, legalise doping and end the corruption

International sport seems unable to escape the stain of scandal. New revelations of systematic doping in athletics will surprise few who have followed the Olympics over the decades. What is astonishing is that they will not go away.

After decades of stories of athletics doping, we now learn that just four years ago a third of all competitors in the International Association of Athletics...

The angst over milk is about the future of our countryside | Simon Jenkins

The dairy farmers protesting against supermarkets are victims of a metropolitan politics which has turned their world into a fear-ridden battleground

Were farmers on the march? Did cows troop through Tesco mooing in protest at the outrageous high prices being charged for milk, thus risking oversupply and a price bubble? I don’t recall it. That was back in 2006, when the farm-gate price of milk boomed from 18p a litre to 26p in 2008, and then to 32p by 2013, while feed prices fell and profits s...