Matthias Matussek, once London correspondent of Der Spiegel and now its culture editor, not to mention brother of top diplomat Thomas Matussek, has a book out. Wir Deutschen: warum die anderen uns gern haben können is meant to be a call for a renewed German patriotism and pride in culture. This would usually suggest a [...]

First of all many thanks to the kind folk of Afoe offering me the possibility of expressing my views on some European reactions to the Mittal Steel bid for the European steel giant Arcelor. By now most of you must have heard about this sitation. Mittal Steel is the world’s largest steelmaker and was founded [...]

José Barroso, European Commission president, yesterday advised Tony Blair not to act like the Sheriff of Nottingham, taking from the poor to give to the rich. I don’t know whether Tony’s been taking his advice, but this decision seems significant, and seems to reflect a willingness to try and get a deal. I don’t [...]

As regards his more general attitude to the war, you must not rely too much on those feelings of hatred which the humans are so fond of discussing in Christian, or anti-Christian, periodicals. In his anguish, the patient can, of course, be encouraged to revenge himself by some vindictive feelings directed towards the German leaders, [...]

This doesn’t look like it’s going to be a good week for GWB, with the Valerie Plame affair far from resolved, some blog attention is now moving back to the issues raised at the time of the arrest of Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan (any connection with Mohammed Barbar?) in the Pakistan more or less [...]

AFP
The investigation quite early led us to have concerns about the movement and activities of four men, three of whom came from the West Yorkshire area,” said the head of the Metropolitan Police anti-terrorist squad, Peter Clarke.
“We are trying to establish their movements in the run-up to last week’s attack and specifically to establish whether [...]

Very hard to interpret the information we are receiving right now. Much of it may well be aimed at the terrorists themselves so it is also perhaps better not to dig too deeply.
There are, however, a number of rival (but possibly) compatible theories. One of these, and it is the one I am following most [...]

I?m grateful for the thought (and the information and the links) that have gone into recent posts by my co-blogger Edward. I find myself disagreeing with him about only one thing: That the London bombing will (or should) lead to a major change in the way we see things, or to the West?s anti-terror strategy [...]

This is not an analytical “perspectives” type post. Just a number of bitty threads that seem in one way or another worth noting (small pieces loosely joined). They could basically be grouped together under the following headings: photos, suicides, explosives and origins.
Maybe I should also point out the obvious: that living in Spain while [...]

A quote from a Johann Hari post, via Digby:
But another fight began yesterday: to defend our civil liberties ? and especially those of the decent, democratic Muslim majority ? in an age of terror. I headed for the East London Mosque ? a few minutes? walk away from the bomb in Aldgate ? to watch [...]