THE liberty of the press is the birth-right of a BRITON, and is justly esteemed the firmest bulwark of the liberties of this country. It has been the terror of all bad ministers; for their dark and dangerous designs, or their weakness, inability, and duplicity, have thus been detected and shewn to the public, generally … Continue reading A message from a friend of Liberty
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A Letter on the Gaza Peace Plan
29 September, 2025. There is little, one might have thought, that the rulers of the world could have done, to make themselves more odious to decent people. And yet, as ever, they have found a way: Sir Tony Blair, it is said, is in discussions to lead “a post-war transitional authority in Gaza”, named the … Continue reading A Letter on the Gaza Peace Plan
Sir Keir Starmer meets Donald Trump
A messenger was dispatched half a day's journey before us, to give the king notice of my approach; and to desire that his majesty would please to appoint a day and hour, when it would be his gracious pleasure, that I might have the honour to lick the dust before his footstool. This is the … Continue reading Sir Keir Starmer meets Donald Trump
A Dialogue on Gaza
A: I understand that you wanted to put some questions to me regarding the atrocities that we see daily in the Gaza Strip, and the defences—the hideous defences—so often made by the venerable members of our political and media establishment. B: Yes—I thought that it would be useful for us to survey some of the … Continue reading A Dialogue on Gaza
Thomas Hobbes explains climate change denialism
"Adhaerence To Custome, From Ignorance Of The Nature Of Right And Wrong Ignorance of the causes, and originall constitution of Right, Equity, Law, and Justice, disposeth a man to make Custome and Example the rule of his actions; in such manner, as to think that Unjust which it hath been the custome to punish; and … Continue reading Thomas Hobbes explains climate change denialism
English government summarised
“It is agreed to by all really disinterested persons, that the government of England—not any individual government, but the general system—is one mass of immorality in practice, whatever it may be in theory. The whole working is founded on a system of conventional hypocrisy from first to last. The general modes of doing business are … Continue reading English government summarised
A Letter on the British Constitution
A new book by Lord Hennessy and Andrew Blick (Could It Happen Here? The Day a Prime Minister Refuses to Resign) makes amusing and instructive reading: the authors speculate about what might ensue if a right-wing populist prime minister were to lose his majority in the House of Commons, and attempted to cling to power … Continue reading A Letter on the British Constitution
Perry Anderson is wrong about populism
A Radical Journalist on Teachers in the early Nineteenth Century
The Examiner was among the greatest Radical newspapers published in England during the early nineteenth century; and its best writer was Albany Fonblanque, whose articles mixed a nimble wit with the most biting and impressive political analysis. In one article from 1827 he addressed the fate of teachers; and for a text of nearly two … Continue reading A Radical Journalist on Teachers in the early Nineteenth Century
A Curious Episode in the Life of John Stuart Mill
William Thomas Thornton, one of John Stuart Mill's colleagues at the East India Company, (and a writer on political economy—it seems the Company's employees were involved in serious intellectual activities, of a kind that we can scarcely imagine taking place among the professional classes today), recorded a remarkable episode in Mill's life in a book … Continue reading A Curious Episode in the Life of John Stuart Mill
Notes in the Margins of the Days 