According to Slate Barack Obama is now 127.5 delegates away from the nomination (or 121.5 if you count seven pledged delegates who previously supported Edwards). Wonder what’s keeping Clinton going.
Daily Archives: May 18, 2008
The Crewe cut
Next Thursday sees the Crewe and Nantwich by-election, which just might turn out to be one of those pivotal by-elections. Andrew Rawnsley has some sharp comments about the nature and tone of the Labour campaign up there.
What was once regarded as the cleverest electioneering operation in the democratic world has descended into a crude parody of the silliest and nastiest aspects of political campaigning. Labour activists dressed in toppers and tails stalk the Tory candidate to attack him as a ‘toff’ because his family built up a successful chain of shoe repairers. It’s not Edward Timpson who is made to look like the nob by these puerile games.
When not playing the class card in a juvenile way, Labour has been playing the race card in a poisonous way. The BNP is not standing in the seat, but you could be forgiven for thinking that you were looking at their stuff when you read some of Labour’s campaign material. One Labour leaflet invites a vote against the Tories on the grounds that they ‘oppose making foreign nationals carry an ID card’. The Tories actually oppose making anyone carry an ID card. Labour should be ashamed of stooping to xenophobia to try to cling on to the seat. They are getting this down and dirty because so much is at stake here, especially for the Prime Minister…
XO+XP=POXX?
This morning’s Observer column…
Much heat and little light were generated last week by the announcement, made jointly by Microsoft and the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project, that Windows XP is to be made available on the project’s ‘XO’ laptop, the little green machine aimed at the world’s poorest children. Next month, trials of Windows on the XO will begin in what Microsoft – in a telling phrase – describes as ‘key emerging markets’.
The news has been hailed as welcome pragmatism on the part of Nicholas Negroponte, the project’s director. But among some of his colleagues and in the wider Open Source community, it has also been excoriated as a betrayal. Which view is correct? Both…
The Mosley orgy (contd.)
From this morning’s Telegraph…
An MI5 agent has resigned after it emerged his prostitute wife engineered the tabloid sting that exposed Max Mosley, the head of motor racing, as having taken part in a sado-masochistic orgy.
An MI5 agent has resigned after his prostitute wife engineered the tabloid sting that exposed Max Mosley, the head of motor racing, for taking part in a sado-masochistic orgy.
The disclosure is deeply embarrassing for Britain’s security service and has forced a review of vetting.
The man was a surveillance operative with several years of service. His wife, 38, is believed to have approached the News of the World when she realised that Mr Mosley – a regular client – had booked five prostitutes for a sex session costing £2,500…
There’s a novel in here, somewhere.