The Politics of Dancing

Autumn begins to retreat and winter advances as London becomes colder, the light more anaemic and the trees drop their foliage to stand naked and forlorn. I have taken to clinging to my duvet in the morning. Why do we feel so safe in bed when in truth we are at our most vulnerable? A duvet and pillow little protection against earthquake, fire, flood or masked intruder. Still it is the pleasantest of illusions, snuggled up in warmth and comfort we feel ourselves holding the world at bay. Last week walking along the South Bank, the Thames the colour of dirty cement, the sky slate grey, and as I looked across at St Paul's London seemed to have lost some of its glamour. Perhaps it was my mood, the day, or simply the past viewed with rose coloured spectacles. Still the London skyline has certainly changed immensely since when I arrived in the city in the early 1980’s, and not always for the better. Whole sections of the City now look like those brochures you see for Abu Dhabi or ...

Britain is not Twitter,” I don’t know if it was David Cameron’s best line, but it certainly hit home, in just four words highlighting the flawed world-view of the delusional left. Cameron’s whole speech was a master-class in how to appeal beyond your core vote, he was less interested in how the speech went down in the hall than how it played with Labour and Lib Dem voters. Nothing could have contrasted more starkly with Corbyn’s speech to the Labour Delegates on the coast in Brighton. That Cameron’s speech was often profoundly dishonest will be missed, what people will remember is the tone and those oh so telling jabs at Corbyn and the current state of the Labour Party. The response of the Corbynites to Cameron’s misrepresentation of Corbyn’s remarks about Bin Laden was truly hilarious. The added irony is that Cameron could have quoted Corbyn verbatim and, pointing out precisely where Corbyn made them, made his point even more strongly. Cameron was pr...