How right was Alastair Campbell in TNW #455 to recommend the printing of the whole chapter on Brexit from Moisés Naím and Quico Toro’s The Revenge of Power, which formed your Charlatans cover feature in TNW #457? We do need to keep alive our anger and despair on this greatest of con-tricks and the charlatans who perpetrated it.
David Powell
Abergavenny
As Simon and Garfunkel sang in The Boxer, a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest. Well, some people do anyway. We have a modern word for all this charlatanry – scam. If it sounds too good to be true, it almost certainly is.
David Rolfe
As the article about charlatans says, the British public now “regret their choice” of Brexit by 2:1 and have turned to… Nigel Farage! Can someone please explain this to me?
John Hyder-Wilson
True, there is a percentage of the population that is gullible, but also a portion whom the Guardian writer Marina Hyde has identified as the “fuck you” tribe and who vote accordingly to destroy the status quo.
Simon Pocock
Sonia Sodha rightly makes the link between Andrew Windsor, Jeffrey Epstein and grooming gangs (TNW #457). This should also be extended to the networks in the Catholic Church, a sacred institution that protected its clergy despite them abusing thousands of children.
To use the power of God for their terrible acts and cover them up at the highest levels is shocking and unforgivable. How these institutions can still survive in the 21st century is beyond belief.
Rev Jose W Gonsalves
London NW9
In TNW #457, Matthew d’Ancona and Paul Mason provided a superb overview of the diverse views surrounding Gaza, and Stan Abbot’s piece about the collection of Palestinian artefacts kept safe in Geneva reminded us of the relevance of a historical perspective.
How might historians in 2125 assess the present situation? They may view this era as the beginning of the end of the three Abrahamic religions, because the peoples of the “Holy Land” had eradicated one another.
Dr Chris Williams
London N4
Matthew d’Ancona (“Trump’s very explosive peace”, TNW #457) is right – the Palestinians are indeed short of leaders, not least because the Israelis have an unpleasant habit of eliminating anybody who shows any possibility of being able to unite them.
Hamas asked for Marwan Barghouti to be released, and the Israelis refused, so unless Trump can persuade them otherwise, he will remain incarcerated. The IDF attempted to assassinate Bassam Shakaa, because he was another figure who could unite the Palestinians. They succeeded in blowing his legs off, but not silencing him.
Ann Harries
In “Student antisemitism and the socialism of fools” (TNW #457), Paul Mason bemoans what he terms incidents of antisemitism in the UK. At least Mason wants to see a sovereign Palestinian state, the removal of Israeli settlements from the West Bank, Netanyahu at the ICC and a two-state solution.
But he could also choose to use some of his passion on the killing of so many women and children in Gaza, the use of mass starvation and the cutting off of basic supplies to Gaza by Israel; and then there is what is happening in the West Bank. The charge sheet against Israel is long, and many people have enabled and endorsed what Israel has done. After all, Israel “has the right to defend itself”.
Keith White
Cheltenham
Paul Mason is over the top with his salutary criticism of some of the opposition to Israel. Specifically, his critique of the settler-colonial analysis is quite wrong, particularly when the many Jewish groups supportive of the Palestinian struggle use this analogy.
It is disingenuous to say that the “oppressors” have lived in the land for 3,000 years, unless the atheist he claims to be believes the triumphalist writings of the Pentateuch. Yes, the Hebrew people lived there for 3,000 years, but they were not oppressors any more than the many other tribes who lived there. The history could be said to be one of multiculturalism.
The oppressor description is very apt for the Zionist movement’s 20th century and later history, as is the analogy of settler colonialism.
Roger Gordon
North Shields
Re: Nicky Woolf on Jon Stewart’s chances of running for president. I think there’s a lot to be said for having a president who doesn’t really want the job. To paraphrase Douglas Adams, no one who actually wants to be president should ever be allowed to do it.
Mostly because they tend to want it for the wrong reasons– personal gain, power, the need to win, and certainly not a genuine desire to run, preserve and hopefully improve their country. For all of its citizens.
David Monksfield
Re: Marie Le Conte’s Dilettante on failing as a film buff (TNW #457). Good for her though, getting herself through the cinema door and paying for being bored.
I love going to the cinema, with the almost religious sense that you are with perhaps like-minded people, sitting in the dark either laughing, crying or nodding off with boredom. Marie shouldn’t beat herself up – often the highest-rated films can be a tedious disappointment. I can recommend I Swear, the true story of Tourette’s sufferer John Davidson, and how he has met that challenge.
Judith A Daniels
Cobholm, Norfolk
Thank you for Nerd’s Eye View on daylight saving time (TNW #457), especially the news that its inventor William Willett is an ancestor of the singer Chris Martin. No wonder Coldplay wrote a song called Clocks.
Judith Winter
Regarding Hilary Sutcliffe’s letter (TNW #457), Tim Berners-Lee did not invent the internet. He invented the world wide web. In other words, the software, not the hardware.
Roddy Grant
The Caerphilly by-election has laid bare reality. Despite their unexpected defeat by Plaid Cymru in the Valleys of South Wales, Reform UK remains a clear and present danger.
Labour is out of the fight, and the only party capable of stopping the far right in Wales is Plaid Cymru. Similarly in Scotland it is only the SNP that can hold the line against Nigel Farage.
Between now and next May’s important elections for parliaments in the devolved countries of the UK, Plaid Cymru and the SNP deserve the support of people of goodwill throughout the UK.
Dafydd Williams
Abertawe/ Swansea
BELOW THE LINE
Like Ros Taylor, I thought I’d hate Celebrity Traitors (“Dead On Arrival”, TNW #457). But it is classic family fun. I love watching it with my daughter.
STEPHEN CUMMINS
I never wanted to watch the normie version, but thought this celeb iteration might be fun. I’m enjoying it enormously and apparently the ratings are huge – so far from it being “killed”, I expect it will end up dying from being done too often.
ALISON KEYS
I watched Celebrity Traitors out of pure curiosity and against my better judgement am hooked. What a bunch of wimps these “celebs” are, not a nasty streak in any of them! If Alastair Campbell had gone on (Diary, TNW #457) he would have eaten them alive!
ADAM PRIMHAK
Just watched The Monster of Florence (“Kill, Stream Repeat”, TNW #457). It was very oppressive and dark, especially if you’re a woman. I’m glad the era it represents seems to be over – though some men haven’t yet caught on.
LETI BERMEJO
