Columnists M - Z
Janet Street-Porter: The two Davids tell farmers what to do
Published: 04 January 2007
My local farmer in Yorkshire has just spent three days in the rain up to his knees in water and mud digging a drainage ditch near my house, for £12 an hour. Who'd work on the land in the winter, when you're paid just a bit more than most cleaners in the posher parts of London? And yet everyone seems to have an opinion about farmers, what they grow, how they run their businesses, and what help they should be given.
Mark Steel: Will anyone remember this grumpy old man?
Published: 03 January 2007
Thomas Sutcliffe: Ethics aside, citizen reporters get scoops
Published: 02 January 2007
When ITV scheduled I Was There, a review of the year which sidestepped the traditional suppliers of news coverage in favour of "citizen journalists", they can't have known that the year's end would bring the most macabre example yet of this growing trend - the mobile phone footage of Saddam Hussein's final drop.
Joan Smith: I'll always have my memories of Little Chef
Published: 02 January 2007
John Rentoul: If Gordon Brown is wise, he will not be promising to restore trust in government
Published: 02 January 2007
John Walsh: Tales of the City
Published: 02 January 2007
John Rentoul: Mr Blair is entitled to stand by his refusal to apologise for helping to oust a dictator
Published: 31 December 2006
Editor-At-Large: There's more to life than a shiny U-bend
Published: 31 December 2006
Housework - woman's work or a male conspiracy to keep us in our place? After all, it's pretty hard to be taken seriously if you're wearing Marigolds and clutching a duster. How I loathe housework. It reminds me of my teenage years when my parents refused to give me any pocket money unless I had ironed all the sheets each week, cleaned the bathroom and vacuumed the carpets. By the way, I was studying for exams, working as hard as my father, but somehow housework was never considered part of his script for life. The minute I got a job, I got a cleaner.
Joan Smith: Moral? This is just state-sanctioned murder
Published: 31 December 2006
Master Alan Watkins' Almanac: Master Blair has a clever Scheam. He is desirous to make Peace with Mr Brown
Published: 31 December 2006
Brian Viner: Fiendish questions of sport... folk songs, novels and who was Mrs Bart Conner?
Published: 30 December 2006
Here, a week later than promised, is this column's annual end-of-year quiz. For many of the questions I must thank Nick Stewart of the Lord's Taverners, who set them for the dinner and balloon debate in aid of the Taverners which took place in the Long Room at Lord's earlier this month. I have also added a few of my own. And I am delighted to announce a fine first prize: a year's supply of Spitfire beer - 365 bottles - donated by the brewers Shepherd Neame. For five runners-up there will be a selection of CDs, offered by Nick Stewart, who does something important at Warner Music.
Donald Macintyre: Is it time for Israel to start talking to Syria?
Published: 29 December 2006
Joan Smith: Shopping is the true spirit of Christmas
Published: 28 December 2006
I'm not sure which was more irritating, driving to Somerset on Christmas Eve to the strains of some terrible Christmas singles or returning to London yesterday accompanied by incessant adverts for the winter sales. When the choice is between Noddy Holder of Slade and a man offering cut-price sofas from DFS, it's hard not to think that you have finally reached the bottom of the barrel of Western culture. These days, I like to think that the slight air of desperation in the voices of actors urging me to think about a new patio is down to global warming; everything is happening earlier than it used to, and I did most of my shopping for bargains well before the celebrations even started.
Hamish McRae: Here comes the shopping revolution
Published: 27 December 2006
Joan Smith: The ghastly values that link masked Muslim women to ministers obsessed by ID cards
Published: 27 December 2006
Thomas Sutcliffe: The weird world of the news searches
Published: 26 December 2006
As the year draws to its close,it's clear that the competition for most morale-lowering news report of the previous 12 months has been a hot one. Global warming, the war in Iraq and the crisis in Darfur have all done their bit - with Korean nuclear tests and Lebanon adding to the sense that long-range optimism may be a symptom of certifiable mental illness, rather than a viable way of looking at the world. But, although I know it doesn't really compete with any of these genuine crises, I couldn't help but feel sandbagged by the revelation, just before the contest closed, that Paris Hilton had topped the list of Google news searches for 2006.
John Walsh: Tales of the City
Published: 26 December 2006
John Rentoul: When the PM talked of 'people skills', was he possibly referring to Mr Brown?
Published: 24 December 2006
Editor-At-Large: Forget that designer frock. I'm fine in fleece and woolly socks
Published: 24 December 2006
I am spending Christmas and my birthday in the heart of North Yorkshire, 10 miles from a shop and an hour's drive from fashionable Harrogate. There's nothing more relaxing than reading the latest copy of Vogue, and then tossing it in the recycling bin because you are going to be wearing a comfy "pod" wardrobe day in and day out and don't require a corset dress by an unpronounceable English designer that costs £799, or a shredded pair of leggings worn with chaps.
Joan Smith: What is Posh's special talent? Being married
Published: 24 December 2006
Alan Watkins: There were eras of Wilson and Thatcher. Will there be an age of Brown? I doubt it
Published: 24 December 2006
Deborah Orr: A freewheelin' Bob Dylan is let loose on the radio - what a brilliant idea
Published: 23 December 2006
'It's night time in the big city. A woman in a red gown throws out her cellphone. A man sleeps with a gun under his pillow. It's Theme Time Radio Hour ... with your host Bob Dylan." Bob Dylan's radio show always starts with the voice of a deadpan woman describing some variation on a film noir theme, and intoning solemnly that the great man is coming on the air.
Christina Patterson: No sex, please - I am tired and it's Christmas
Published: 22 December 2006
Last week an editor asked a single friend of mine when she last had sex. My friend paused to do some mental maths and then replied. "Oh dear," said the editor. "So many people lead lives of quiet desperation!"
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