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 Tuesday 9th March 2010
Why I want to start a new school
Okay, it’s a bit pathetic. But I need something to keep me going. I’m currently leading the efforts of a group of parents and teachers in Acton to set up Britain’s first “free school” and it’s a Herculean task. We have to find a site, devise a curriculum, recruit the staff and persuade the government to pay for the whole kit and kaboodle. I recently met with Jonathan Fingerhut, the leader of a parent group that has succeeded in setting up a voluntary-aided school in Barnett, hoping for some encouragement, but he was plainspoken to a fault. “To be honest, if I’d known at the beginning of this process what I know now, I would never have taken it on,” he said. (To read more, click here.)
Monday 8th March 2010
Does Cameron make a convincing leading man? My "Hollywood" take on the general election campaignHaving stayed up to watch the Oscars last night, I've been thinking about the general election campaign from a Hollywood perspective. Could the reason for Labour's unexpected surge in the opinion polls be due to the fact that Gordon Brown is a more compelling character than David Cameron? Imagine, for a second, that this election campaign is a Hollywood movie. The first question is what genre does it fall into? Answer: a sports movie. A typical sports movie documents a David-and-Goliath battle between two teams -- or two individual sportsmen -- over the course of a single season. There is the dominant team or sportsman -- the clear favourite -- and the plucky little underdog whom no one expects to win. (To read more, click here.)
Sunday 7th March 2010
Oscars live blog
Saturday 6th March 2010
The Vanity Fair Oscar partyYou can tell it's Oscar season at Vanity Fair's offices because you begin to overhear members of staff having the following telephone conversation as you wander down the main corridor: "Who? Oh my God! How the hell are you? I haven't heard from you in, like, 10 years, man." Pause. "Gee, I'd love to help but there's really nothing I can do. I'm not even invited myself. Sorry." Click. Dial tone. (To read more, click here.)
Saturday 6th March 2010
Christopher Hitchens claims to have slept with two Tory ministersNo doubt the reason Christopher Hitchens claims to have slept with two Tory ministers in his forthcoming memoirs is to garner a bit of publicity. According to the hard-drinking journalist, he seduced two men at Oxford who went on to serve in Margaret Thatcher's government. He wisely refuses to name them, thereby ensuring the press indulges in a frenzy of speculation. I'm not sure this tactic will endear him to the critics. I don't mean they will disapprove of this cheap publicity stunt. Rather, they will wonder why he never made a pass at them. Hitchens is such an inveterate party-goer that almost all the men asked to review his book -- and they will inevitably be men -- will have shared a glass with him at one point or another. Now that they know that the Hitch is a switch hitter, they will feel personally slighted. (To read more, click here.)
Friday 5th March 2010
Live blogging the OscarsI'll be live blogging the 82nd Academy Awards on the Telegraph site on Sunday -- or, rather, the small hours of Monday morning. You can follow the action on Sky Movies Premier from 1am. This year's hosts are Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin, who should make a reasonably entertaining combo. But please God let's hope they don't open the show with a "musical number". (Actually, a version of Brush Up Your Shakespeare from Kiss Me Kate could work.) Sacha Baron Cohen was due to do a sketch about Avatar with Ben Stiller -- "Is it because I is blue?" -- but that's now been shelved due to "creative differences". In the two most important categories -- Best Picture and Best Director -- it's a two-horse race between Avatar and The Hurt Locker, a competition enlivened by the fact that James Cameron and Kathryn Bigelow used to be married to each other. Could there be a lesson here for another Cameron about the dangers of being an early favourite to win? The Oscars have been described as "the gay Super Bowl" and I'll be doing my best impersonation of a metrosexual on the night, commenting on shoes, frocks, hairdos, etc. I'll also be staying in constant touch with my most bitchy friends around the world via Twitter and repeating their best gags. I don't think there'll be any shortage of material.
Friday 5th March 2010
I would vote for Geert WildersA good deal of hand-wringing will be taking place in Holland this morning following the announcement that Geert Wilders' Freedom Party has made significant gains in the country's regional elections. If the Party receives the same support in the national elections on June 9, Geert Wilders will be Holland's next Prime Minister. "The Dutch political system, based on consensus and co-operation, is coming apart at the seams," noted NRC Handelsblad, Holland's newspaper of record. (To read more, click here.)
Thursday 4th March 2010
A few tips for the Dalai Lama now that he has joined TwitterI was pleased to see that the Dalai Lama has joined Twitter -- and I'm not the only one. Since he signed up to the micro-blogging site, he has attracted over quite a few followers. However, I regret to say that he has already made several beginner's errors and is unlikely to get the most out of the site unless he follows two basic rules. (To read more, click here.)
Wednesday 3rd March 2010
New formula for finding the perfect wifeI was pleased to discover that a group of social scientists have come up with the formula for a perfect wife. According to a study published in the European Journal of Operational Research, a man should marry a woman who’s five years younger than him, from the same cultural background and 27 per cent more intelligent. It’s that last characteristic that jumps out. I can understand why it’s essential that a wife should be more intelligent -- someone has to know how to operate the DVD player, after all -- but why 27 per cent? Is the idea that if the gap was any smaller, husbands wouldn’t be able to tolerate their wives and if the gap was any bigger wives wouldn’t be able to tolerate their husbands? Or is it that women think they’re 13.5 per cent less intelligent than they really are, whereas men over-estimate their intelligence by 13.5 per cent, so a wife needs to be exactly 27 per cent more intelligent than her husband in order for the two of them to imagine that they’re intellectual equals? (I realize that the degree of deflation for women would have to be less than 13.5 per cent and the degree of inflation for men greater than 13.5 per cent, but I haven’t got a high enough IQ to work out the correct percentages. Perhaps I should ask my wife.) (To read more, click here.)
Wednesday 3rd March 2010
Cameron's strategy in the TV debates should be to get Gordon to throw a tangerine at himThe fact that terms have been agreed and the televised Prime Ministerial debates are now going ahead must be good news for Cameron. The reason I say this is not because I think Cameron is a more skilled debater than Brown — though he usually gets the better of him in the House of Commons. Rather, it’s an opportunity for Cameron to goad the Prime Minister into losing his temper. (To read more, click here.)
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