I make no judgement; I merely report:

A friend of mine, who is one of the shrewdest observers of French politics, tells me that his hunch is that the polls are completely wrong, and have not taken proper account of how almost half the votes will be cast next Sunday. His prediction is that the poll will be topped by Bayrou, with Le Pen as runner up.

(2)

This is inspired.

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Oliver Kamm has a very good post on a piece by John Kampfner in this week's New Statesman about Nick Cohen's book. Do read the whole post.

I have one point to make. In his piece in the Statesman this week, John Kampfner (who is a friend) refers to a piece he wrote in 2003 "in which I sought to explain how a small group of British politicians and journalists, who counted themselves as still of the left, had more in common with the US neoconservatives than they cared to admit."

But, as Oliver Kamm points out:

Those Kampfner named were an eclectic group, of whom only two - John Lloyd and David Aaronovitch - clearly counted themselves as "still of the left". The others comprised two prominent figures in the Conservative Party (one was the MP Michael Gove, and the other was Daniel Finkelstein, former Director of Research for the party); Stephen Pollard, who does not count himself on the Left at all; and Melanie Phillips, whose views I would categorise as communitarian rather than left-wing or right-wing. Of these, and so far as I know, only Stephen is an identifying neoconservative.

Where things go even more awry is in John Kampfner's piece this week, in which he writes:

It matters that Cohen, like his fellow pro-war cheerleaders, comes from a far-left background. It was a part of the far left that brooked no dissent. They do not come from the mainstream left, which I would loosely define as social democratic or democratic socialist or liberal. They come from a tradition where politics is about black and white, and where opponents (even those who diverge slightly) are heretics. Polemic comes easily to them.

I am, of course, one of those pro-war cheerleaders. My political trajectory can be, and often is, criticised or pilloried. But in all the great variety of labels I have had attached to me (my favourite was when I was working for the Fabian Society, and Socialist Organiser awarded me their Prat of the Week title) never once have I been described as having had a "far-left" background.

Which is not surprising really, given that my political memberships have been :

1980-87 Young Conservatives

1987-2001 Labour Party

1989-92 researcher to Peter Shore

1992-95 Fabian Society

1995-97 Social Market Foundation

Then again, I was Chief Leader Writer on that hotbed of Trotskyism, the Daily Express. I guess that's the "far-left background".

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Should you be so inclined, you can read my chapter on sport in Living and Giving, the Jewish Contribution to Life in the UK, 1656-2006 here.

There are also chapters by Lord Janner QC, Lord Kalms, Sir Sigmund Sternberg, His Honour Israel Finestein QC, Prof Geoffrey Cantor, Prof David Katz, Gr Gerry Black, Alex Brummer, Norman Lebrecht and Henry Morris.

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I'll be the studio guest on Anita Anand's programme (presented tonight by Phil Williams) on Five Live tonight, between 22:00 and 01:00.

UPDATE: When I point out that it's tonight, I mean that it's...tonight! ie Thursday evening.

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If you've ever wondered why it is that the Independent is happy to publish a writer such as Robert Fisk, who distorts the truth so regularly, I can now provide an explanation. The Independent, as I now know from my own experience, is happy to distort quotes out of all context.

I've been away all this week. Mind you, even when I'm here I rarely see the Indie, and certainly not its diary column. So until I was rung on Tuesday by the Jewish Chronicle to be asked about it, I had no idea that on Monday this item appeared in the Indie's Pandora column (the link has to be paid for - don't waste your money):

Pollard pulling tips

When it comes to "pulling", Blunkett biographer Stephen Pollard seems to have learnt how not to do it from his subject's exotic liaisons.

One of Pandora's lonely hearts - a female member of JDate, the "leading Jewish singles network" - mentions she has been e-mailed by a Stephen Pollard.

She says: "He didn't have a picture on his profile," adding: "We didn't meet in the end. It was mutual." (She refuses to tell me the name of the MP who has similarly contacted her.)

Confirms Pollard: "It was me, yes. I was on it a while ago. I am Jewish - it goes with the territory! I haven't been on it for ages. I hopefully don't have to any more."

So it was a successful search? "No, not from JDate."

O, spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou!

Seems like a sweet enough story, you might think - albeit a story that's not a story. Since when is 'single man once didn't go on a date with someone he had never met' a story?

It happens to be true that I have been on JDate, the Jewish dating site. Indeed, as readers of this blog might know, I have written a play with a friend which will be performed next year about internet dating. Almost every single Jew in Britain seems to be on JDate.

As for the rest of the 'story'?

Here's what happened.

Last week I got a text from someone called Pandora from the Independent who wanted to know if I was the same Stephen Pollard who had written David Blunkett's biography.

I get lots of calls from random journalists asking me about Blunkett and I try whenever possible to be helpful to them, so I replied to 'Pandora' saying it was indeed me.

Was I the same Stephen Pollard who had been on JDate? A friend of Pandora's had once received an email from a Stephen Pollard and she (Pandora) wondered if I was the same Stephen Pollard.

I replied to say it was indeed me but that I hadn't been on the site for ages.

I then got another text about being on JDate and so I sent a curt response and had no further communication with 'Pandora'.

And that was all I knew until on Tuesday the Jewish Chronicle rang me, having seen the diary story above. They wanted, they said, to print it.

I wouldn't bother any of you with this deeply unimportant story but for the fact that it shows the journalistic standards of the newspaper which regards Robert Fisk as a reliable writer about the Middle East - and that this non-story about my non-date has now appeared in two national newspapers, since it's also in today's JC. With one important difference. The JC story adds this:

But an indignant Pollard tells us that the quote was made up. He has been on JDate, he does not mind admitting, but why, he asks, is that news?

The JC's version is accurate, because that newspaper comforms to basic standards of accuracy by speaking to people from whom it runs quotes; and it doesn't distort the context of text messages.

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Well, er, yes...

(4)

Do have a read of Daniel Finkelstein's Writer's choice. He's spot on in his judgement of Marquand's importance as a thinker and writer.

It turns out that Tim Worstall, whose pithy blog I read regularly, also writes for a site dedicated to the differences between men and women, La Difference. And he's emailed me with some important observations:

[Y]es, it might be that Simon Baron-Cohen would disagree with your precis.

His research is really stating that there is such a thing as a male brain (systemizing, list making etc), the female brain (empathic) and a balanced type, and that yes, autism can be seen as an extreme form of the male brain.

However, while we might expect women to have female type brains and men male, that isn't actually the way it works out. Some 17% of either sex have the other (if that makes sense?).

Where this begins to make sense, actually become useful, is in looking at certain jobs and professions and seeing what the sexual mix is in them. If women are more likely to have female type brains, we would expect to see more of them in a highly empathic occupation like nusrsing, which indeed we do. If there are certain jobs which appeal a great deal more to systemizing traits, then we'd expect to see many more men in it. But not all one sex or the other, as a significant portion of men are empathic etc etc.

This gives an idea:

If it is true that economic models are very like maps (which Chris Dillow thinks they are) and that understanding them requires the spatial skills known to be associated with the male type brain, then we would expect to see many more male economists than female. Further, we would expect those economists who are female to display attributes of the male type brain, which in the instance of Lynne Kiesling, we do: her map reading skills are much higher than the average man's let alone woman's.

Note that a female's possession of a male type brain is nothing to do with any other male attributes. Ms.Kiesling is quite the hottie (as is Virgina Postrel, another possible data point).

If you're so minded, you can take Prof Baron-Cohen's two tests to discover if you've got a "male" or "female" or "balanced" type brain.

This piece of mine appears in today's Times:

Do the names Adrian Slade, Hugo Rodallega or Wilhelm Furtwängler’s Piano Quintet in C mean anything to you? If even one of them registers, then I have news for you. Whether it is good or bad news is, I suppose, a moot point: you are a friend of mine for life.

If you know about all three, then something truly weird has happened. Someone must have been cloning embryos more than 40 years ago, when I was born.

I tell you this not because I wish to use The Times to find new friends, but because this week I realised something that many people have known for ages. I am really quite weird.

What I am about to reveal next is obvious, if not from my name then at least from the accompanying mugshot. I am a man. And when I say I am weird, what I really mean is that I am a man.

A few months ago I read a fascinating book by Simon Baron-Cohen, Professor of Developmental Psychopathology at Cambridge. He will no doubt recoil in horror at my caricature of his book, The Essential Difference: Men, Women and the Extreme Male Brain, but the basic message I took from it is that men have more “systematic” personalities and women have more “empathic” personalities. The book concentrates on autism as an extreme example of this in men.

Yes, I thought, this all makes sense. After all, Nick Hornby wrote a bestseller, High Fidelity, based on men’s penchant for making lists. I’m sure most men recognised themselves in the book’s theme. But it was only when I spotted Adrian Slade in Bloomsbury on Monday that I realised just how true it is.

Along with a couple of friends, I have a rather sad interest in long-forgotten political figures. A few years ago, for instance, I met the Mayor of Oakland, California. I cannot come close to conveying to you the sheer excitement I felt. The reason? In a former incarnation, he was Governor of California — Jerry Brown, or Governor Moonbeam as he was then known.

Mr Slade, as if you didn’t know, was the last president of the Liberal Party, from 1987 to 1988. Sitting on a bus and spying him out of the window hardly compares, but it nonetheless merited an immediate email to my friends, both of whom understood the frisson I felt.

I know. I did say I was weird.

The Piano Quintet in C is a different matter. It may be part of another obsession — obscure recordings of classical music — but it is at least culturally respectable. Wilhelm Furtwängler is, I would argue, the greatest conductor ever. He also composed, but his pieces were rarely performed, let alone recorded. So when I discovered last week that there is a new CD of his chamber music, I was ecstatic. Most normal classical music obsessives would not even be aware of its existence, let alone care.

As for Hugo Rodallega, he is a Colombian footballer who plays for Club de Futbol Atlas in Mexico. But that’s not how he fits in. This week I was having lunch, and my companion and I discovered halfway through that we have both wasted innumerable hours playing a computer game, Football Manager. In the game, I manage Spurs and Hugo Rodallega is my top scorer. My companion is a Manchester United fan, and so much does he care about his team, and the computer game, that he refuses to pretend to be that club’s manager, lest he be sacked. By a computer programme. In a completely made-up game.

I may have such weird obsessions, but I like to think I am at least relatively normal. Other men have different obsessions, but obsessions they most certainly have. Can you, however, imagine any normal woman behaving like this? Caring — really, really caring — about being sacked in a computer game? Men. Weird.

***************************************

A month ago, the road outside my flat was closed for a week. It was inconvenient but worth it. The surface was relaid and we, and all the environs, ended up with a lovely smooth new road.

Yesterday I got a letter from Thames Water, informing me that it is replacing the Victorian water tunnels where I live. It will take months and cause disruption, but everyone knows it has to be done.

And so it has begun. By digging up the bright, smooth, shiny road, laid no doubt at great expense, a month ago. Isn’t Britain wonderful?

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One of the regular commenters on this site, James, has taken the plunge and started his own blog. You can find it here. Good luck, James, and enjoy the ride.

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Two Arabs boarded a flight out of London. One took a window seat and the other sat next to him in the middle seat.

Just before takeoff, an American sat down in the aisle seat. After takeoff, the American kicked his shoes off, wiggled his toes and was settling in when the Arab in the window seat said, "I need to get up and get a coke."

"Don't get up," said the American, "I'm in the aisle seat, I'll get it for you."

As soon as he left, one of the Arabs picked up the American's shoe and spat in it.

When the American returned with the coke, the other Arab said, "That looks good, I'd really like one, too."

Again, the American obligingly went to fetch it.

While he was gone the other Arab picked up the American's other shoe and spat in it.

When the American returned, they all sat back and enjoyed the flight.

As the plane was landing, the American slipped his feet into his shoes and knew immediately what had happened.

"Why does it have to be this way?" he asked. "How long must this go on? This fighting between our nations? This hatred? This animosity? This spitting in shoes and pissing in cokes."

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Blimey.

This NPR chat about Yiddish is great fun. Especially the discussion on the difference between a Putz and a Schmuck

(via Norm.)

Yes, I know the comments aren't working. Sorry. I am hoping it will right itself since I don't have a clue what's wrong. Given that I was thinking of disabling them anyway to get rid of the spam, maybe it's for the best.

Posting will be very light for the rest of the week.

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A friend has just emailed this genius site:

Cats that look like Hitler.

[Oops. I write Hilter when originally posting this, as the comments make clear.]

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Time for a bit of mutual back scratching. Iain Dale has generously included this site in his top ten journalist blogs. Were I to compile a list, Iain's site would definitely be one of the top three. I look at it regularly, and am amazed how he has the time to update it so often.

Iain's Number One is Paul Linford's site, and I would also endorse the fact it's well worth a look. When I get round to updating my blogroll Paul's site will definitely be there.

Mutual back scratching over.

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If you didn't catch my friend Peter Oborne's remarkable Channel Four documentary on Friday on Sudan and Chad, do read his piece in the Spectator.

Peter has carved out an incredibly brave niche, putting armchair commentators such as myself to shame, travelling to some the most dangerous hotspots in the world, and genuinely risking his life to report what is happening. Prior to visiting Sudan and Chad to look at the Janjawiid's brutality and the battle with the Sudanese Liberation Army, he reported from Basra and Zimbabwe.

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A lovely line from the great Armando Iannucci yesterday:

Asylums are now called care homes. It's madness gone politically correct.

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Does anyone have any suggestions? This site is now being bombarded with spam. Over 80 went up today. I don't want to have to close comments again, but the time taken deleting them is too great for me to continue unless I can find a way of dealing with the problem.

I have a Turing code at the moment but that seems now to be ineffective. What else can I do?

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Just back from seeing The Da Vinci Code. Not having read the book, I wanted to see what the fuss is all about. I shouldn't have bothered. It's an absolute pile of crap. Save two and a half hours of your life and give it a miss.

It did however serve one useful function, revealing a hitherto hidden aspect to the sale of honours scandal. I suggest that Plod goes and sees the film forthwith.

Whatever Lord Levy's alleged involvement in the sale of honours, it pales into insignificance when compared with what the film shows he has been up to.

One of these men is Lord Levy. And one is The Prefect, one of the Opus Dei honchos behind the crimes covering up the existence of descendants of Jesus and Mary Magdalene.

Have they ever been seen in the same toom together? Get on the case now, Mr Policeman.

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Peter Briffa is peerless. When he does one of his pastiches of the commentariat, one must stop everything and read it. So do that, now!

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Apologies for not posting this week. I've been snowed under with other things, and - to be honest - in a state of total depression about anything political.

We have a Labour government that is a bizarre mixture of incompetent, wrong-headed, lying and grasping. The Conservatives are now a sort of SDP Mark II, pathetically pandering to the green lobby and actually contemplating increasing our already record tax burden. And the Libs are, well, the Libs.

And as if Charles Clarke letting murderers, rapists and paedos roam the streets wasn't enough, now the judiciary has got in on the act, hanging out the bunting and welcoming gun-wielding hijackers into their new home in Britain.

Anti-Semites are given platforms to push their anti-Israeli filth across the maintream media. Islamists are on the march. Violent crime is on the increase. And yobs terrify ordinary decent citizens.

No doubt tomorrow I'll wake up and determine to keep up the fight, but at the moment I'm in one of those 'the game is up' moods.

Talking of which...

The one thing which has put a smile on my face is seeing the look of desolation on the faces of those West Ham fans. All the way to Cardiff for nothing. Glorious.

And how sweet that Anton Ferdinand, who scored against Spurs in the last minute at White Hart Lane, should be the man to gift the FA Cup to Liverpool.

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If you like watching freak shows, I will be on the Daily Politics programme on BBC2 tomorrow at around 12.10, talking about the Home Office.

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My letter in today's New Statesman (in response to this):

It is always flattering when someone notices one’s witterings, let alone when so distinguished a commentator as Peter Wilby thinks they have some meaning. But his amusing piece last week about my political leanings contained a couple of howlers.

I am supposedly a hypocrite for writing last week that the Prime Minister is up to his neck in sleaze, yet having stopped contributing to the Statesman because it ran a piece comparing him with Stalin.

I didn’t. If Peter checks the email to which he refers, he will see that I stopped because a review of mine was published next to a piece by a psychiatrist which argued that Tony Blair could be clinically diagnosed as a psychopath.

Even Peter can surely see there is a difference between pointing out that the Prime Minister’s abuse of the honours system is sleazy, and arguing that he is a psychopath.

As for the idea that I “claim to be left-wing but hold no discernible left-wing views”; I make no such claim. When it became clear that the mainstream left opposed the overthrow of Saddam’s tyranny and believed that America had 9/11 coming, I realised that I did indeed have no discernible left-wing views.

If wanting to promote freedom and defend the values of Western civilisation is right wing, I happily accept that label.

Stephen Pollard
London W9

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No posts until Wedneday, I'm afraid.

(BTW, I haven't had to delete a single comment so far. It's looking good.)

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This week's New Statesman has a little piece about me by Peter Wilby. I like him a lot and was once interviewed by him for the job of political editor of the magazine, only to be beaten by John Kampfner, who was in every respect better suited to it than I would have been.

I think what he says is perfectly fair, but there are two howlers.

First of all, he says I stopped writing for the NS because of a piece by Robert Service. I didn't. As I wrote at the time here (as well as to Peter Wilby), it was because of a piece by a psychiatrist, which purported to prove that Blair was a psychopath ("technically, he is diagnosed as a psychopath").

And as for the idea that I define myself as being on the Left: dear me, no. I certainly used to, because I had a strange idea that the Left believed in tackling oppression. But I have bored on and on and on about how I woke up after 9/11, and Iraq, and realised otherwise.

If believing in defending Western civilisation, overcoming oppression, promoting properity and giving the poor the power to excercise the same choice as the wealthy over health and education means being on the Right, that's where I sit. Proudly. As I have already said far too often.

UPDATE: Oliver Kamm has more on Wilbygate and my non-left leanings.

And I love the idea of one of my commenters to this post that, when I joined the Labour Party in 1986, when I spent the years before Blair was anywhwere near the leadership arguing that Labour should embrace competition, markets and profit, when I was spat on by Labour members for advocating the abolition of the NHS, when I left the Fabian Society because of my advocacy of academic selection, when I continue to advocate the abolition of the NHS at a time when even the Leader of the Conservative Party is signed up to 100% tax funding, and when I remain fully in support of the Iraq War, I have been trend surfing. I wish!

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Get a grip, man. Buck your ideas up.

Not everyone, it seems, turns to my Daily Mail pieces for stylistic guidance.

Well, I guess it's a matter of different strokes...to me, this sounds like hell on earth.

Cliff Richard, Lulu, Tom Jones, Denise van Outen.

HELP! GET ME OUT OF HERE!

I might not be posting for quite a while; thanks to War of Attrition winning the Gold Cup at an ante post 12/1, I won't have to work for about another 20 years.

See you in 2026.

PS I'll expect a regular supply of free drinks from everyone to whom I mentioned him!

PPS Desert Quest in the County Hurdle at 5.20 if you want to pick up some loose change. And Tysou in 4.40.

UPDATE: I hope you all took my advice and plunged on Desert Quest, the biggest certainty of the meeting! Even at 4/1, his SP, the bookied were handing out free money. I sat smugly by with my 12/1 ante post.

One thing I've learned since writing for a living is never to surprised by the reaction some pieces engender. The biggest postbag I have ever received, by quite a long margin, was when I was on the Express and I wrote a couple of sentences after Britain had lost in the Davis Cup to the US. My piece was, almost in its entirety:

Who cares? It's only tennis.

The angry letters flooded in. The best was from someone who had clearly gone to a lot of trouble. Using letters that had been cut from newspapers and mags, blackmail style, it simply said:

You hate tennis because you are a fat bastard.

Whilst the latter point was 50 per cent correct, it was of course a non sequitur to associate this with the fact that I consider tennis to be mind-numbingly tedious: the sport for people who don't like sport.

Anyway, the 'don't be surprised' motto is still true. I made a throwaway remark yesterday about the fact I can't stand the sight - and, still worse, the sound - of Rachel Weisz. As of lunchtime today, I have had 63 emails from readers who have the same reaction to Ms Weisz (who may well be the most delightful woman on the planet, a fact which is utterly irrelevant to my loathing of her).

Weird, isn't it, what stirs people!?

One of the joys of moving is finding things you had forgotten even existed.

Unpacking my books yesterday, I came across a book about the 1945 election which we published to mark the 50th anniversary, when I was at the Fabian Society.

I had forgotten I even had the book, let alone that at the dinner that we put on on the night of the anniversary, I got it signed by Roy Jenkins, Michael Foot, Barbara Castle, Denis Healey, Jim Callaghan and Michael Young.

I wonder what other treats await as I open up the boxes,

Sorry about the lack of posts. Normal service will be resumed next week.

I'm back in the land of the living - well, the internet connected, and to celebrate my return I bring news which will, as I know from correspondence, thrill many of you as much as it does me. Metropolitan is, at last, out on DVD, with a full commentary from the cast and Whit Stillman. You can buy it here.

I'm not sure when I'll next be able to post. I'm moving tomorrow, so my internet connection is dependent upon BT's efficiency, not something for which past experience provides any encouragement.

As Captain Oates put it, I may be some time...

Gerard Baker, whose Times columns are essential reading, has joined the ranks of bloggers. His blog has only just started, but I can't imagine anyone more likely to produce a must-read blog, so I'd definitely recommend reading it.

His first posting has a quote from Mo Udall:

You might be tempted to greet the arrival of yet another blog on your computer screen by concurring mournfully with the wisdom of one of the most underrated of American politicians, the late Morris Udall.

"Everything that can possibly be said has already been said," the peerless member of congress from Arizona once opined in the middle of a seemingly interminable debate. "The problem is, not everyone has said it yet."

Udall was a sort of political Yogi Berra. My favourite Udall remark was after the 1976 Wisconsin Democratic primary. The exit polls had projected him as winner, and late at night he made a rousing speech to his supporters. When he woke up the next morning he discovered that the polls were wrong and he had lost. He told reporters at a press conference:

You know all the times I said 'win' last night? Well, I want you to insert the word 'lose.'

There is another quote which used to be attributed to Udall but which, it turns out, comes from Dick Tuck, the Democratic fixer. After losing his bid for a California state Senate seat in 1964 he said:

The people have spoken - the bastards.

How's this for good service:

I was due to go to a couple of concerts this weekend by the Concergebouw orchestra, in my view the finest in the world. For various reasons I had to miss them but, because I knew well in advance, I was able to post the tickets back in plenty of time for a credit voucher.

This morning I got a call from the Barbican Centre, saying they were very sorry but because the tickets only arrived this morning - over 10 days since I posted them - they could not give me credit.

Fair enough from their point of view. The fault lies not with the Barbican, who cannot be expected to give credit for returns which arrive after the event, but with the wretched Royal Mail, incapable of doing the job for which it is paid.

I did not complain - I had nothing to complain about to the Barbican. I simply said how I understood the Barbican could not be expected to give me credit, and then how annoying it was that the post was so ineffecient. 'Can you hold for a second?', the chap replied.

When he came back, he said his manager had decided it was only fair to give me the credit vouchers anyway.

Astonishing. The concerts were sold out with, I gather, large queues for returns. So it's real money they're offering me, not a return on a hall which was half empty.

It's easy enought to moan about bad service, but good service deserves to be praised.

I'm not going to be able to most much, if at all over the next week. So chances are the next post will be next Friday.

But then again, you never know...

You might notice that a posting from yesterday on Interpal is no longer up. I removed it after a few minutes (although I understand that it remained visible for a little while afterwards). It concerned its nomination by George Galloway in the Big Brother programme.

I want to make clear that the charity operates as an entirely legitimate organisation for the relief of suffering and no evidence has ever been produced to suggest otherwise.

Yup. This test pretty much nails me...

You are a Social Liberal (61% permissive) and an... Economic Conservative (81% permissive) You are best described as a: Capitalist Link: The Politics Test on OkCupid Free Online Dating Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

I saw a truly hilarious show last night, Gutenberg! The Musical!, a send up of West End musicals and a lot more besides. It's already had a series of rave reviews, such as this from the inestimable Clive Davis in The Times:

Gutenberg! The Musical! — receiving its world premiere in London — contains more wit and intelligence than three decades of megashows.

I should declare an interest. The producer, Trevor Brown, is a friend, and he will be producing my new play at the same venue in the hopefully not too distant future. Meanwhile, ring the box office on 020 7287 2875 before the whole run sells out. It's on until the end of the month.

David Aaronovitch has a blog. If it's as good as his print writing, it will be a must-read.

Things are back to normal from today. Hurrah - didn't the holiday period just drag?

Which means, I hope, that I will be posting more regularly than in recent months. That's my intention, anyway...

Shameless, moi? A few people have noticed that I have written yet again about my loathing of New Year's Eve.

I wouldn't want to be so rude as turn down editors' requests for it every year. Nor would I want to break my own promise.

And I have a mortgage to pay.

Here's an early Channukah present:

Two beggars are sitting side by side on a street in Dublin. One has a cross in front of him, the other one the Star of David.

Many people go by and look at both beggars, but only put money into the hat of the beggar sitting behind the cross. A priest comes by, stops and watches throngs of people giving money to the beggar behind the cross, but none to the beggar behind the Star of David.

Finally the priest goes over to the beggar behind the Star of David and says: "My poor fellow, don't you understand? This is a Catholic country. People aren't going to give you money if you sit there with a Star of David in front of you, especially when you're sitting beside a beggar who has a cross. In fact, they would probably give to him just out of spite."

The beggar behind the Star of David turns to the beggar with the cross and says: "Moishe, look who's here to teach the Levine Brothers about marketing!"

As you'll have noticed from the paucity of posts recently, I haven't had time for much blogging. I think things are looking up now, so fingers crossed there should be more posts.

But so much has happened about which I've not been able to comment that I thought I should provide a brief summary of my views, so that this site is now bang up-to-date:

Brown's Pre-Budget Report: the game's up

Brown: unelectable

David Cameron: good

Flying terror suspects to other counties to be interrogated/held: fine

Flying them to to be tortured: not fine at all

Harold Pinter plays: good

Harold Pinter: twat

Montreal agreement: much ado about nothing

Blair EU budget proposals: too much ado about a lot

Paraguay, Trinidad and Sweden: lucky

Turner Prize: yawn

John Lennon anniversary: even bigger yawn

End of the Routemaster: bad

Bendy buses: bloody awful

No, I'm not on commission:

Jon Stewart, the wonderful host of The Daily Show (which, praise be, is now on More4 at 8.30 everynight) is appearing on 11 December at the Prince Edward Theatre. It took me forever to track down this website on which I could book tickets.

Public Service Announcement over.

Very good point in Niall Ferguson's column today:

As far as I can see, the only significant differences between the 50 states are climatic. And even then, the range is relatively narrow by global standards. To prove my point, ask yourself where you would end up if you flew the same distance - around 2,500 miles - eastwards from London. The answer is Baku. How about flying the same distance from Zurich? You'd be in Khartoum.

If an Australian flew 2,500 miles north from Perth, he'd be just short of Kuala Lumpur. Consider the immense cultural differences that separate these places and you realise that the most amazing thing of all about the United States is not its polarisation, but its homogeneity.

That's also borne out by serious scrutiny of American public opinion. In their fascinating new book, Culture War: The Myth of a Polarised America, Morris Fiorina, Sam Abrams and Jeremy Pope comprehensively debunk the notion that American society is deeply divided. On a whole range of issues, which don't get debated because consensus is taken for granted, Americans have strikingly similar views. Even on the issues about which the political class gets excited - abortion, homosexuality and religion - it's remarkable how much common ground there is.

"On the whole," the authors conclude, "the views of the American citizenry look moderate, centrist, nuanced, ambivalent… rather than extreme, polarised, unconditional [and] dogmatic."

Should you so wish, you can hear Any Questions here.

I'm on Any Questions tomorrow night (8pm, Radio 4, repeated Saturday at 1pm). The other panellists are Baroness Tonge, Alun Michael MP and some Conservative chap called David Cameron.

If you're bored witless on Friday night, your stupor will be made worse if you tune in to Radio 4 at 8pm.

Oh no! I've been excommunicated!

It's a debate that's run and run, but I've finally decided to take Stephen off our list of Labour-supporting bloggers. As with anyone else who might be taken off the list, it's not a punishment, and it doesn't even necessarily mean I think the person is wrong, merely a recognition that people have to broadly back the party, or it defeats the object. I suppose this article was the clincher.

I would still encourage you to look out for his articles, at least for variety, and a link can be found in our sidebar.

I had no idea I was even on the site. And I'm as amazed as some of the commenters that I was. Bloggers for Blair, yes. But for Labour? I gave that up when I realised that New Labour - as good as Labour is ever going to get - is just tax and spend with a modern gloss.

As I love telling mainstream Labour members when I see them: I've remained loyal to Blair because of the war, not in spite of it. The look on their faces when the realisation dawns that I am 100% serious is simply priceless.

I've stolen this joke from the comments section on Harry's Place:

A Jelly Baby walks into a bar and starts talking to a Smartie.

After a few beers the Smartie says "Ere, a bunch of us are heading to that new club, fancy tagging along?"

The Jelly Baby says "No mate, I'm a soft centre, I always end up getting my head kicked in."

"So", Smartie says. "Don't worry about it, I'm a bit of a hard case, I'll look after you."

Jelly Baby thinks about it for a minute and says "Fair enough, as long as you'll look after me", and off they go.

After a few more beers in the club, three Lockets walk in.

As soon as he sees them, Smartie hides under the table.

The Lockets take one look at jelly Baby and start kicking him, breaking cola bottles over his little jelly head, lamping him with little sugary chairs, and generally having a laugh.

After a while they get bored and walk out.

Jelly Baby pulls his battered Jelly Baby body over to the table and wipes up his Jelly Baby blood.

He turns to Smartie and says, "I thought you were going to look after me."

"I was!" says Smartie, "But those Lockets are menthol!".

Sorry for the absence of posts. They'll be sporadic for a while, as almost all my time is taken up at the moment writing a play I've been commissioned to write. It's all very exciting - there'll be more details of it appearing in the new year. Watch this space!

From an interview with Gordon Ramsay about his forthcoming C4 show, The F Word:

You say you'll be tackling other topical issues - like what?

Well I don't know yet, because if I did, they wouldn't be topical, would they?

UPDATE: Blimey - a bit of a slip there. I had originally written Gordon Brown above. Mind you, that would be a show I'd watch...

Jon Stewart of The Daily Show on why he worked on Rosh Hashannah:

It was also the first day of Ramadan. I figured they cancelled each other out.

Returning to the theme of great headlines, a friend told me one last night which surely wins.

A local newspaper report of a library closure carried this headline:

Book Lack In Ongar

Shana Tovah. Watch this; it's brilliant.

A correspondent has pointed out that there is one all-time winner of the Best Headline Ever contest (which beats even the NY Post's Headless Corpse in Topless Bar).

Since I've cited it myself on this site, I shouldn't have omitted it. Here it is:

WARNING: Don't click on the link if you're offended by swearing...

This is perhaps the best (or worst) headline ever.

No posts until Saturday, I'm afraid.

Sorry that postings have been so limited of late. A combination of work and having to concentrate on domestic matters (I'm moving) has meant I've been neglecting the site. Fingers crossed things are back to normal now.

There are two new sites which I'd like to recommend. First, Adloyada has been started by one of the most indefatigable campaigners for the right of Israel to exist and defend itself from terror, and is well worth a look. Today she's highlighting the stupidity of Richard Harries' crowd of bishops and their latest witterings on Iraq. I will be posting more on this myself later on today.

Do also have a look at Democratiya, which describes itself as

a free bi-monthly online review of books. Our interests will range over war, peace, just war, and humanitarian interventionism; human rights, genocide, crimes against humanity and the responsibility to protect and rescue; the United Nations, international law and the doctrine of the international community; as well as democratisation, social and labour movements, 'global civil society', 'global social democracy', and Sennian development-as-freedom.

Its first issue is full of interesting things, not least a typically insightful piece by Harry (of Harry's Place) on 'The Pro-Liberation Left'.

If you haven't already, do have a look at The First Post - the UK's first internet magazine.

I'm going to be writing regularly for it, and will link to my pieces on this site. My first, on the Aspen Music Festival, is here.

Libby Purves is clearly a woman of rare insight and perception:

THE FIRST THING to say is that Stephen Pollard (Thunderer, yesterday) is right. The EU Trade Commission is being hypocritical and stupid over Chinese clothing imports, slapping on violently protectionist quotas and impounding millions of innocent trousers. His indignation was expressed largely on behalf of the developing world, a concern which I endorse...

I'll be on the Today Programme at 6.50 this morning talking about my new pamphlet for the Centre for Policy Studies (on how the Conservatives could become an acceptable home for Blairites)...of which more later.

UPDATE: You can hear the interview here (scroll down to 06.41).

So I go away to this.

And I come back to this and this.

I disappear for two weeks and the world turns on its axis. They'll be deporting Islamofascists next.

Thanks so much to everyone who asked for a t-shirt. I seriously underestimated the number of people who realised that there was indeed such a thing as a free lunch (well, t-shirt) and so I have ended up disappointing over a hundred people. Apologies.

Meanwhile, I'm taking a rest from this site for the next fortnight. I'll be posting again from Wednesday 17th August.

We've heard a lot from G8 leaders this week about how they intend to link dealing with corruption to aid. One Nigerian politician has a plan.

Norm can. But I can't.