Commentators

Dominic Lawson: We should have no reason to be surprised when a doctor turns out to be a murderer

What should a genocidal mass-murderer look like? And what professional qualifications should he have? Of the two men indicted by the Hague war crimes tribunal as masterminds of the planned massacre of thousands of Bosnian Muslim adults and children, Ratko Mladic fits all our preconceptions.

Inside Commentators

Mark Oaten: I know what Max Mosley has been going through

Friday, 25 July 2008

The moment The News of the World broke the Mosley story, it brought back memories of my own experiences. It's probably pretty obvious that I've been following the case closely, but I never thought he would succeed. The verdict we got on Thursday really was, in my view, a landmark ruling with far-reaching ramifications.

Andy Burnham: In a lawless zone, we must protect the vulnerable

Friday, 25 July 2008

Young people – and today I am addressing 300 of them at the European Youth Parliament in Liverpool – might think this a contentious statement: I believe we should pay for music. I don't mean pay through the nose, as we did from the 1970s through to the 1990s, but the principle must be that we should pay something.

Michael Brown: A Brown exit is Cameron's biggest worry

Friday, 25 July 2008

A year ago this week, the Tories came third in the Ealing by-election. The result followed a disastrous campaign, with "David Cameron's Conservatives", as they were being referred to, falling victim to Gordon Brown's political honeymoon.

Terence Blacker: Why are doctors so oddly thin-skinned?

Friday, 25 July 2008

There will be more grumpiness than usual this week in doctors' surgeries across the country. GPs, already wearied by the demands of anxious, needy members of the public, have another reason for discontent. They are not, as a profession, trusted quite as much as they feel they should be. Under a new scheme, they are to be appraised, of all humiliating things, once a year. Worse still, there will be tests once every five years designed to "revalidate" them. "I feel very upset," Dr Satyajit Dasgupta told the BBC. To be asked, after 32 years' in general practice, to take an examination to prove his worth was "insulting".

Robert Verkaik: This could take the 'sting' out of journalism

Friday, 25 July 2008

Max Mosley's calculated risk in exposing yet more details of his sexual peccadilloes in order to win his case against the News of the World has allowed the courts to send a clear message to the prurient press.

Nigel Morris: This could be the knock-out blow for a PM on the ropes

Friday, 25 July 2008

Crewe and Nantwich falls into Tory hands for the first time in half a century. Labour comes fifth in Henley. More than 300 Labour councillors are kicked out of office in town hall elections and Boris Johnson takes control of London. Labour's opinion poll support crashes to an historic low of less than 25 per cent. How could it get any worse for Gordon Brown?

Calling all fakers: are you living a lie?

Thursday, 24 July 2008

Your debts piled up, your mortgage repayments were getting harder - and that canoe in the garage provided an apparent route to freedom. And you would have got away with, except for those pesky Panamanian estate agents.

Steve Richards: Here are a few items for Gordon Brown to put on his holiday 'to do' list...

Thursday, 24 July 2008

When Prime Ministers are in deep trouble they tend to lose a sense of proportion. Big and small challenges merge into one seemingly unpassable mountain. Only when they step back from the daily frenzy do some of them get a clearer perspective.

Johann Hari: Crime problem? Just lock 'em in the lavatory

Thursday, 24 July 2008

And so the story of the moral implosion of the British prison system comes to this: we are imprisoning people in toilets. Doncaster prison – run by the private firm Serco – was designed to hold 800 people, but it now pens in more than a thousand. So the governors have put beds in the toilets, and detained people there for more than 18 hours a day, week after week. In toilets. In Britain. Today.

Adrian Hamilton: Ultimately, this is as much about politics as justice

Thursday, 24 July 2008

"Closure" is the word that people keep using about Radovan Karadzic's arrest and likely trial for war crimes in The Hague. And in the sense of the closing of a chapter it is probably the right word – or would be should the real nasty in the Bosnian massacres, General Ratko Mladic, be caught. If the specialists are to be believed, that should follow soon.

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