“... four years. They haven’t spelled out how they are going to do it, and until recently Gordon Brown was talking about ‘Tory cuts versus Labour investment’ – which, given what he must know about what the figures mean, is jaw-droppingly cynical. The reality is that the budget, and the explicit promises of both parties, imply a commitment to cuts of ...”

“... president alone. To head the CIA Obama picked Leon Panetta, a former congressman who had served as Bill Clinton’s chief of staff. Panetta was a complete outsider to the world of spies: it could have been predicted that he would be overawed by the company he now kept and come to defend their actions present and past with the anxiety of someone who has to ...”

“... fact, as the historian Richard Hofstadter once said, it possessed all the ‘moral grandeur of a bill of lading’. It contained no criticism of slavery and did not free all slaves; the legal status of at least 800,000 slaves was not affected. The proclamation did not free those held in bondage in the four slave states that remained loyal to the ...”

“... In the 1990s, threatened by a possible challenge from Mario Cuomo, the governor of New York, Bill Clinton declared that the American people would never elect a president whose surname ended with an ‘o’. In India, the BJP ideologues thought the electorate wouldn’t accept an Italian woman. Many others agreed. Several months ago, on a flight to New ...”

“... and distributed by a state organisation with a no-nonsense Attlee-era moniker, redolent of brown paper envelopes and blotched stencils and corridors smelling of disinfectant: the Central Electricity Generating Board, the CEGB. Littlechild suggested splitting the National Grid off from the power-generating side of the CEGB, privatising regional ...”

“... provide. There was no Robert Frost or Allen Ginsberg in space, but we have Buzz: ‘Our blue and brown habitat of humanity appeared like a jewel of life in the midst of the surrounding blackness. From space there were no observable borders between nations, no observable reasons for the wars we were leaving behind.’ Leaving behind? Come, come Buzz. He was ...”

“... character has been fleshed out in novels, as-told-to memoirs and wistful outsider essays. Black Bill, who appears in the Country Life journalist Ian Niall’s Poacher’s Handbook (1950), is a perfect specimen. He has a black, tousled beard and an over-large jacket and can charm partridges from their roosts with a brass whistle. He also uses raisins to ...”

“... then of the Wall Street Journal, who give his palace manoeuvrings and business dealings the Tina Brown treatment.* MBS is next in line to the throne of Saudi Arabia and already its de facto ruler. He is likely to reign for a very long time. He grew up the much indulged son of King Salman and his controversial third wife, Fahda, whom Salman’s elder children ...”

“... the civil service after the Hutton Inquiry into David Kelly’s death, but returned when Gordon Brown became prime minister in 2007.) Cameron appointed Greensill, who had left Citigroup to start his own firm, as an adviser. He was given a desk in the Cabinet Office and a secure Number Ten email address. In 2014, he was made a UK crown representative and ...”

“... of community and advocacy groups, New York City Council signed up to a plan proposed by Mayor Bill de Blasio to close Rikers Island by 2026 (later delayed to 2027) and replace it with four new jails, in Queens, the Bronx, Manhattan and Brooklyn. These would hold a combined 3300 people – far fewer than the current facilities. Since the plan was ...”

“... premiereship. In this, of course, he shares responsibility with Roy Jenkins, Shirley Williams and Bill Rodgers. But there can be very little doubt that the existence of the SDP was the major factor in sustaining Thatcherism in defiance of the fact that the Tories were unable to achieve more than a fraction of the popular vote in either the 1983 or the 1987 ...”

“... of contemporary corporate democracy’. This revolt against the era and ethos of the CBCs (Bill Clinton, Blair, Bush Jr, Brown, Cameron and Hillary Clinton) offered the giddy prospect of ‘a jailbreak from the old order’, filling its supporters with ‘energy and glee’. Barnett respects ‘the audacity of those ...”

“... of Crossman’s on the opposite side. In Parliament, he was overtaken by younger men – George Brown, Jim Callaghan, even Denis Healey. When Labour returned to power in 1964, he was given the important, but hardly central, office of President of the Board of Trade. Three years later, he was brutally and unceremoniously sacked. Since then, he has hung on in ...”

“... They now intend to bring teenagers home forcibly by introducing a Criminal Justice and Police Bill which includes plans to impose fixed penalties for disorderly behaviour in public places and to raise the upper age limit for curfew to 15. A curfew has in fact been in force in relation to the under-tens since the passing of the Crime and Disorder Act ...”

“... be dramatic. As he passed through London last October, on his way to solve Africa’s problems, Bill Gates predicted that in ten years every student in the English-speaking world would be able to purchase, for around $400, a tablet-sized device that could access every textbook for every conceivable taught subject. This machine would, of course, be retailed ...”