Victoria Woodhull was quite a gal. Having once been an actress and prostitute in Gold Rush San Francisco, she moved on to New York and was ‘reborn’, becoming the first female broker on Wall Street, then founding her very own newspaper to promote her political dream – which was to stand for the presidency in 1872, fighting under the banner of suffrage, free love and equal rights for all.
President Obama: “We don’t have a stronger friend and stronger ally than Nicolas Sarkozy, and the French people.”
The ruling party hardliners who coordinated the latest crackdowns, like Air Marshal Perence Shiri (“The Butcher of Matabeleland”), are also guilty of carrying out Mugabe’s massacres against minority amaNdebele people in the 1980s. They rightly fear prosecution as war criminals.
Denis Boyles: Strauss-Kahn’s erasure from French politics and the IMF, will have almost no effect on international finance. Its only effect will be on French domestic politics. Sakozy’s failure as a politician was to distance himself from France’s ruling élite. That’s why he was elected in 2007 – his victory was a victory over the incestuous, self-serving énarques who had driven French voters from indifference to despair. Now there are more énarques in Sarkozy’s government than there were in Chirac’s. He has become one of them.
Fukuyama missed some things, of course. He did not see that capitalism would be a considerably more robust component of the post-cold war world than either liberalism or democracy. He was optimistic that US power could accelerate some of the positive trends he described, a view he repented a year into the Iraq war. One now reads in his writing signs of his own country in decline.
“We are not allowed to talk while we are working,” says 19-year-old Wang Cui, whose name was changed for this story. She has prominent eyes and dark skin, and wears a blue vest with the Foxconn logo over her white plastic jacket. Her long fingernails are well cared-for. She does not work on the production line, but instead performs quality control on iPad housings.
The other poll, released earlier in the day, showed that a majority of Republicans, faced with choices such as those above, think there should be a none-of-the-above choice.
A hesitant president, a skeptical SecDef and a cautious Air Force chief of staff made a curious trio of warmongers in the days leading up to the United Nations Security Council resolution that authorized “all necessary measures” to protect civilians in Libya, paving the way for a coalition force to start airstrikes March 19.
Bin Laden brought his end upon himself. Putting him on trial would have been – well – a headache. But it is – or should be – the enemies of civilisation who exalt at the grave action of killing in cold blood.
AV would be proportional in name only: it tends to hurt the Tories badly when they are down and to help Labour when it is up, and it always boosts the Liberal Democrats, Britain’s third party.
The death of Osama Bin Laden is undoubtedly a welcome event, even if it was perhaps an unlawful one. There is a sense that it was a just outcome, even if there had not been any due process…
Five years ago 19 per cent wanted neither Charles nor William to become king: they wanted the monarchy scrapped. That number has declined by one third.
It is well attested that Wallis tried to stop Edward from abdicating. She wasn’t in love with him, didn’t want to be queen and was horrified when she realised how much he was giving up.
That’s how far things have gone. In addition to anxiety caused by the border tension, Thais are being told that everything is not what they think it is. Last week’s satellite malfunction that resulted in blank TV screens nationwide was purportedly not a technical error, but a well-executed warning to the Thai military that if they plot a coup, they won’t have any channel to broadcast it on.
Alan Wall: The Janus Face of Metaphor. | Clues and Labyrinths. | Ruin, the collector and sad mortality.
The Wedding: Good, old-fashioned Royal Family (production) values.
Michelene Wandor: On Friday, April 29, 2011, our couple are friends. They have lived together – as one royal biographer said, without mentioning the word ‘sex’: ‘This is a woman who knows exactly what to do.’ And yet, a guest agony aunt on TV, asked for her advice to the bride said: ‘Have a son quickly, and don’t take any lovers.’ Plus ca change?