How Scapegoating Misses the Target — It’s gays, it’s blacks, it’s white privilege; it’s feminists, it’s misogynists, it’s (Jewish) bankers; it’s foreigners, it’s migrants, it’s asylum seekers, it’s junkies, it’s drug dealers . . . The list could go on and on, but I think you get the idea. Truth is it’s none of the above…

I enjoyed reading this, Linda. It encapsulates precisely the dillemas we face in mid life. As for me, I am beyond dreaming and actually living it! Now in my eighties I can look back on a few mistakes (like the time in my forties when I decided to become a…

The desire to rid the UK Parliament of the current Conservative majority is frequently accompanied by demands for PR — Proportional Representation. Certainly there can be little doubt that the way that MPs are elected at present, which frequently results in one party winning a majority of seats despite failing…

I am a Liberal. Always have been, always will be. I’m not talking neo-liberal, or any of the other distortions of liberal ideals that have gained currency in recent times. I’m talking radical, progressive and, yes, woke. In recent weeks various video clips have popped up in my Twitter feed…

My review of Absent Friend by John McKenna It begins with the author discovering Cohen’s music after a near fatal encounter with teenage meningitis. It ends with the production of a requiem mass on which he collaborated with the Canadian singer-songwriter. Part memoir — there are inevitably glimpses into the author’s own life — part biography — Cohen’s…

Is independence compatible with prosperity? I have fond memories of summer holidays with family friends in the early 1950s in a village near Swansea. A short way up the road from the family home was a small nursery where we would go to purchase tomatoes. We followed the elderly gentleman…

Could you do the same? — At the beginning of last year (2022) I decided to investigate the possibility of installing solar PV panels on my roof. I live in Ireland where the government offers a grant for home energy projects. …

Political revolution at the time of the industrial revolution. — Edward Despard was born just a few miles from my present home in my adopted county close to the centre of Ireland. On February 21st 1803 he was executed by hanging, followed by beheading, for his part in a conspiracy to assassinate King George III. Peter Linebaugh has examined Despard’s…

Neither are you — unless you are a parasite — Seeing a bird soaring in a clear blue sky, riding thermals, it is easy to see how the phrase ‘as free as a bird’ was born. But the reality is that the bird is not engaged in the pursuit of pleasure. …