..This campaign has seen many personal tragedies and we owe it to those who have made the ultimate sacrifice to recognise that their courage and skill is visible in the ever more capable Afghan Army and Police.Increasingly the Afghans themselves are taking the lead in providing security across Helmand. This transition is allowing Afghans to gain the confidence to reject the Taliban and live normal lives.9.26am: Here is some more reaction to the leaked Vince Cable letter from the morning programmes. I've taken the quotes from PoliticsHome.From Jeremy Hunt, the culture secretaryI think if you read the whole of that letter, first of all Vince Cable is very honest and says that he needs to do more and his department needs to do more, but he's actually doing what all cabinet ministers do, which is write to the prime minister and write to the chancellor and say, look, honestly, this is what I think we're doing well, and this is what I think we need to do better at.
The two Eds, behind the scenes, lurking in the shadows, always plotting, always scheming, never taking responsibility. At this time of crisis what Britain needs is real leadership. This is no time for the back room boys.(This is an echo of Gordon Brown's "no time for a novice" speech to the Labour conference in 2008. But I'm not sure it really works. Miliband and Balls were back room boys, but they're not now. Balls is hardly ever off the airwaves.)3.20pm: Clegg says another term of Labour would have been "a disaster for the economy".3.21pm: Clegg turns to the tuition fees debacle. He says that he saw the anger and that he knows how much damage was done by what happened.Probably the most important lesson I have learned is this: No matter how hard you work on the details of a policy, it's no good if the perception is wrong.
12.56pm: Peter Beresford, professor of social policy at Brunel University, has written a post on the Guardian's Joe Public blog suggesting Dilnot does not go far enough.12.58pm: And while we're on the subject of Dilnot's presentation (pdf), he was very proud of the figure on page 21. It illustrates who much his plans would cost as a proportion of overall public spending (very little).1.01pm: Here's a lunchtime summary.? Andrew Dilnot, the Oxford economist, has published a report designed to produce a long-term solution to the problem of funding care. Under his plan, which he said would cost the state ￡1.7bn a year, people would not longer have to risk losing almost all their life savings to pay for their in old age.
I'll post again after 11.30am.11.37am: Just back from the lobby.? David Cameron will make a statement about the cash-for-access affair at the end of his speech (ie,
www.cnnhkids.com, at about 12ish). I'm told he will give details about the internal Tory inquiry into the affair.? Francis Maude, the Cabinet Office minister, will make a statement in the Commons at 3.30pm about party funding.I'll post more from the lobby in a moment.11.42am: Here are the key points from the Number 10 lobby briefing.? Francis Maude, the Cabinet Office minister,
kate spade bags, will announce details of how he plans to revive talks on the reform of party funding in a Commons statement at 3.30pm. Number 10 said the government was still committed to proceeding "on a cross-party basis".
? Tax regulations which discourage foreign investors taking up municipal bonds to be scrapped? Government to work with the LGA to raise awareness among pension fund trustees of the opportunities for prudent triple-A infrastructure investments.10.19am: Last week the Press Complaints Commission announced that it was closing down and setting up a new body to take charge of newspaper regulation. This morning Lord Justice Leveson has made it clear that he is not endorsing the new arrangement. There are full details on our Leveson live blog. Photograph: Cate Gillon/Getty Images 10.27am: Jack Dromey, the shadow housing minister, isn't impressed by the Grant Shapps housing initiative. (See 9.00am.
That's it for today. Thanks for the comments.Politics live blog: PMQs, Fred Goodwin reaction and Nick Clegg on Lords reform8.55am: Was it a good idea to strip Fred Goodwin of his knighthood? In the papers and on the airwaves there is quite a backlash against the move today. Sometimes populist gestures turn out to be not that popular, although we won't know what the public think until we see some polling. But we know what Alistair Darling, the Labour former chancellor, thinks. This is what he told the Today programme.I really think that in a country like ours, where we pride ourselves on the rule of law and there being a due process and where others look to us, to get ourselves into this situation .
The "O, my America" quotation, now with a lower-case "o", has become grimly ironical and, more importantly, part of an address not to a lover's body, but to his own. In discovering his own, isolated male nakedness, Actaeon breaks another taboo. He has no alternative, as before, and no further story, except, perhaps, that he will be forced (by loneliness or ill-health) to get to know this nakedness more intimately. His body may be a Newfoundland, but it's one which can be greeted only with irony. He's not even a stag any more.ActaeonO, my America,
kate spade wallet sale, my NewfoundlandJohn Donne, "Elegy 20"O, my America, discovered by slim chance,behind, as it seemed, a washing lineI shoved aside without thinking –does desire have thoughts or defineits object, consuming all in a glance?You, with your several flesh sinkingupon itself in attitudes of hurt,while the dogs at my heelsgrowl at the strange red shirtunder a horned moon, you, drinkingnight water – tell me what the eye stealsor borrows.
It should be added at this point that the macho tabloids were also intimidated by Savile and Smith – their public status, their bullying and manipulative power – though they never admit to their share of the blame. Surely sex scandals are their turf, not that of the prissy BBC.Is this a sex scandal? By French or Italian standards – think Dominique Strauss-Kahn or Silvio Berlusconi – it would probably be regarded as a quiet evening at home knitting by the fire. But Britain takes a stern view nowadays of sexual harassment, and rightly so, though it does so in the context of a coarse public permissiveness about sex that would shock our parents.Fashions in hypocrisy change, as they do in most things.
Chat Sentinela
