Names of Wonder

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Saturday, 11 February 2012 at 6:14 pm I am deeply grateful to Alex Massie, a fellow admirer of American footballers’ names, who sent me this list of wonders culled from the Rivals.com list of the coming year’s top 250 high school players in America: Laremy Tunsil Su’a Cravens Tyrone Swoopes Ricky Seals-Jones …

Bill will survive; Andrew will not

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Sunday, 12 February 2012 at 10:27 am I said Andrew Lansley may not be long for this Cabinet in The Independent on Sunday a fortnight ago, so in today’s newspaper I repeat myself at greater length. Last week’s “Kill the Bill” fuss was displacement activity and posturing by Labour and the royal colleges of NHS …

A defence of competition in health care

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Monday, 13 February 2012 at 1:40 pm Just when you thought he was six feet under and all forgotten, Andrew Lansley comes bouncing back up to the surface in rude health. He has finally written an article that (a) I can understand, and (b) says some brave and right things about reforming the …

“Not growing inequality”

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Monday, 13 February 2012 at 11:30 pm What do we want? “A fairer sharing of rewards not growing inequality.” Well said, Ed Miliband (in Sheffield last week). Growing inequality very bad. Widening gap between rich and poor one of Labour government’s greatest failings. “For the five years before the last recession, the …

Tunnel, light at end of

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Wednesday, 15 February 2012 at 10:05 am At some point, doom and gloom about the economy is likely to turn round. Obviously, if the eurozone goes into an economic nuclear winter, then our prospects may still turn out to be worse than we thought, again. On the other hand, there are …

Reminders of Iraq

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Wednesday, 15 February 2012 at 7:25 pm I was sorry to learn from Paul Waugh of the death of Brian Jones, the former Defence Intelligence Service official who felt that his doubts about some of the intelligence on Saddam Hussein’s weapons programme had been ignored by the Government before the Iraq war. He …

Circular firing squad at a crossroads

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Wednesday, 15 February 2012 at 10:16 pm Politico has identified seven dreadful clichés of campaigning in and commenting on the Republican primaries. Some of them (“It’s the economy, stupid”) are already on my Banned List; some of them are US-specific (“Democrats fall in love; Republicans fall in line” — when choosing their nominees); but …

Why can’t Ed be like Barack?

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Friday, 17 February 2012 at 9:40 am Mehdi Hasan, in The Independent today, urges Ed Miliband to espouse economic populism. First I had to overcome my distress at discovering that Hasan has not read my book, in which I explain that James Carville, Bill Clinton’s campaign manager in 1992, did not write “It’s the …

Mandelson’s Plan for Europe

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Friday, 17 February 2012 at 1:23 pm Peter Mandelson’s short speech in the House of Lords yesterday was a fine contribution to the debate about what Britain should do about the unravelling of the euro. He said that the task for Europe is to create an Economic and Monetary Union Mark II, …

Poll alert

By John Rentoul Eagle Eye Saturday, 18 February 2012 at 10:33 am We have a ComRes opinion poll in The Independent on Sunday tomorrow, shared with the Sunday Mirror. Our poll last month had Labour and the Conservatives tied on 38 per cent. The most recent ComRes poll, carried out by telephone rather than online, for The Independent on 1 February, found a 1-point Labour lead. …