Letters to the Editor
Ilanin
Published Letters: 27 Editor's Choice: 10
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Terrorist/Guerilla movements have been defeated by regular troops...
[Read the article: Mission to be decided]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Most obvious examples:
Malaya 1948-60 Malayan Federation and Commonwealth troops soundly defeat MRLA guerrilas.
Northern Ireland 1968-99 (ish) Terrorist movements fought to a standstill by British regulars and have (more or less) switched to a peaceful resolution of their dispute. Poster child for Mr. Conason's propsed strategy.
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"A free pass" indeed
[Read the article: The World Cup cometh]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Speaking as an Englishman who knows what sort of performances his team tend to turn in during the group stages of major tournaments, I think you're entirely too sanguine about their prospects. True, on paper, the English team is incredibly strong and ought to be one of the favourites; but matches aren't played on paper. In practice, this is the team that managed to lose to Northern Ireland in their penultimate qualifying match. England are almost as likely to foul this up as Spain. Possibly even more so.
England haven't beaten Sweden in decades; in addition England *always* manage to produce an incredibly boring draw at some point in their group matches. England will probably end up squeaking through with draws against Paraguay and Sweden and then thrashing Trinidad & Tobago .
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"The Beautiful Game" vs "1966 and All That"
[Read the article: The World Cup cometh]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]kouhoutek - I'm sorry, but even as a fellow England fan I've got to pick a hole in this. England might play the Beautiful Game now; or at least they're at their best when they do so (I still don't think we're as pretty as Brazil or Holland on song, mind), but in 1966 they won ugly. Alf Ramsey was hammered for England's playing style in the press repeatedly, and his defence was always "we will win the World Cup playing this way". He happened to be right, but that didn't make it any prettier.
England's "wingless wonders" played a style that was essentially defensive - borne out by the results. England kept four clean sheets in six matches, scoring a total of nine goals in normal time (plus two in extra time against West Germany in the final). By comparison, West Germany scored fifteen goals, third placed Portugal seventeen goals, and the fourth placed Soviet Union, generally regarded the most defensive team in the world at the time, ten goals, one more than England in the same length of time.
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Spot the Difference
[Read the article: Britain's Bush clone]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Superficial similiarities are one thing; actual similarities are another. Cameron is his own man (Bush was Cheney's puppet ever since he picked himself as VP), and has for some time been regarded as first a member and then the flagbearer of the "Notting Hill" set of liberal (in the classic, British, Gladstonian sense of the term) Tories. Bush appointed a mixture of neocons and hard-right authoritarians to office once elected; the only real right-winger in Cameron's shadow cabinet is Dr. Liam Fox, who has been given Defence, where you might expect the token hard right man to be stashed.
Cameron, unlike Bush, is a legislator (he represents the borough of Witney, in Oxfordshire, as opposed to the county itself), and his record in Parliament is thus available to examine. He voted against (most of) Labour's anti-terror legislation, ("This Christmas tree Bill has been round every Department and pieces have been hung on it.") and in favour of the civil partnerships bill. He voted in favour of going to war in Iraq but has been as unimpressed with the manipulations of available intelligence as everyone else has. It hasn't been a major issue recently in Britain and it wasn't discussed during his leadership race, so his recent opinion is difficult to gauge.
Finally, Cameron is an excellent speaker, and apparently universally regarded as a genial companion and an intelligent man. I'm not sure I've ever heard any of those three phrases applied to Bush, except possibly the last one in desperation by Republican pundits.