19 February 2001
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From the Editor…
Welcome to the New Statesman website. Whether you are a new reader or an existing one - online or via the magazine - I hope you'll enjoy the great writing, fresh ideas and provocative debate that make the New Statesman Britain's award-winning current affairs weekly
Cover story
The New Statesman Special Report - Milburn eats up patients' rights
How well does the NHS treat its patients? In the wake of recent controversies, Anthony Browne looks at the record of the present Health Secretary
Features
Why Brits prefer foreign bosses
Martin Vander Weyer detects a loss of national confidence behind our growing practice of filling top posts from overseas
Brotherhood of man and roundworm
The left can celebrate the latest news on genes, but not too much
Not spinning, but drowning
Politicians and their media advisers are usually blamed for the voters' apathy. But are the political journalists to blame, too? Nick Cohen reports
The case for killing a president
Why do American leaders so often attract the attention of potential assassins? Philip Kerr finds a philosophical answer
A long wait on Alexanderplatz
A personal account of the frustrations of NHS queues
In praise of clunky old Beattie
BT's profits are down, its telephone kiosks history.Stefan Sternon a fading national icon
The strange geography of names
Why does Italy have so many surnames and Wales so few?
The end of Blunkett's grand illusion
Business won't put money in state schools unless it also gets control. Labour's latest plan suggests that ministers now understand this. Francis Beckett reports
Culture
A sure fang
The myths that fed the vampire tradition are all but exhausted. Yet in a world where the living are revived by the organs of the dead, the genre is bound to survive, argues Tom Holland
Back to the future
Art - Tom Rosenthal on the bombast and beauty of futurism
Books
Inventing allies in the sky. Stephen Jay Gould has written his most disappointing book, a wrong-headed attempt to equate religion with morality. By Kenan Malik
Rocks of Ages: science and religion in the fullness of life Stephen Jay Gould Jonathan Cape, 241pp, £14.99 ISBN 0224060929
Home bird
Backpack Emily Barr Headline, 375pp, £5.99 ISBN 074726676X
Fade to Gray
The Two Faces of Liberalism John Gray Polity Press, 168pp, £35 ISBN 0745622585
The Sun is God
The Oxford Companion to J M W Turner Evelyn Joll, Martin Butlin and Luke Herrmann (eds) OUP, 419pp, £60 ISBN 0198600259
Love online
Cybersex: uncovering the secret world of Internet sex Dr Kimberly Young Carlton Books, 206pp, £12.99 ISBN 1842221566
Novel of the week
Perfect Tense Michael Bracewell Jonathan Cape, 169pp, £10 ISBN 0224044516
Laureate of shame
Emerald Germs of Ireland Patrick McCabe Picador, 380pp, £14.99 ISBN 0330391615
Rewriting the self
Tiger's Eye Inga Clendinnen Jonathan Cape, 289pp, £12.99 ISBN 0224061232
Commentary - Why I hate Hannibal Lecter
Amanda Craig deplores the cult of the snobbish cannibal
